The application of pulse‐current gold plating has been studied in the fabrication of x‐ray mask patterns to attain uniform thickness and low stress. Pulse‐current plating with low average current density (iav) has proven effective in improving uniform plating thickness over a wide range of pattern sizes. This result can be explained through the duplex‐diffusion layer model. Stress in the gold plated by lowiavbecomes compressive. However, this stress can be eliminated by annealing. This annealing effect is attributable to the contraction in volume of plated gold due to the thermal desorption of hydrogen atoms.