To improve the wear resistance of 304 austenitic stainless steel, in this paper, the surface of 304 austenitic stainless steel samples was pre-plating nickel treated by an electroplating method, subsequently gas nitriding was performed in flowing high-purity NH3 gas below 450 ℃. The microstructure and microhardness of the nitrided layer were carefully studied by scanning electron microscope (SEM), X-ray diffractometer (XRD) and microhardness tester. In order to extend the application of nitrided stainless steel, GCr15 and Si3N4 materials with serious different hardness were selected to simulate different service environments for counterparts. The wear resistance was evaluated by using a ball-disc tribometer. A continuous nitrided layer about 6.34 μm thick was formed on the surface of the substrate in the duplex surface treated sample at 400 ℃, but no nitrided layer was formed on the surface of the single nitrided sample. The thickness of the nitrided layer of the duplex surface treated sample at 450 ℃ was 24.26 μm, which was 7.85 times that of the single nitrided sample. The nitrided layer of the duplex surface treated sample at 400 ℃ was mainly composed of γN-Fe, and that of the duplex surface treated sample at 450 ℃ was mainly composed of γN-Fe and a small number of chromium nitrides. The maximum hardness of 400 ℃ and 450 ℃ duplex surface treated samples was 780HV0.05 and 1450HV0.05, respectively, which is 3.3 and 6.2 times that of the original material. Compared with the original material, the wear volume loss of duplex surface treated samples at 400 ℃ and 450 ℃ had fallen by about 75.7% and 89.4% with GCr15 as counterparts, and that had fallen by about 82.5% and 88% with Si3N4 as counterparts. The results show that the pre-plating nickel treatment is great benefit to gas nitriding, and the thickness of the nitrided layer, microhardness and wear resistance of duplex surface treated samples were remarkably improved.