Abstract: A thin film magnetic recording head has a flux path in which during writing magnetic saturation occurs in the throat section of the leading pole rather than in the trailing pole. This keeps the stray magnetic fields generated in the area where the saturation occurs during writing from distorting the just-recorded data pattern in the medium, since the leading pole is spaced sufficiently far from the data pattern as it is created adjacent the trailing pole. Preferably, this is accomplished by making a cross section area of the flux path in the leading pole throat section physically smaller than the minimum cross section area in the remainder of the leading pole or in the trailing pole and is throat section.