The influence of frictional treatment on the micromechanical characteristics, phase composition, residual stresses, surface roughness and damage of the AISI 321 austenitic stainless steel is investigated. The frictional treatment is performed with a hemispherical synthetic diamond indenter, loaded with 294 N, in a non-oxidizing argon medium, by varying the number of indenter strokes over the same part of the surface. It has been established that, to achieve substantial hardening, high quality and sufficient contact strength of the steel surface, it is expedient that, with the used process parameters, the frictional treatment of the AISI 321 steel be carried out with the number of double strokes not exceeding 14. Herewith, frictional treatment with 14 double strokes increases microhardness by a factor of 3.7, up to 730 HV0.025, while providing low surface roughness with Ra = 0.23 mm and highly increased ability of the surface to resist mechanical contact, this being supported by the data of kinetic microindentation. Lee H., Kim D., Jung J., Pyoun Y., Shin K. Influence of peening on corrosion properties of AISI 304 stainless steel. Corrosion Science, 2009, vol. 51, iss. 12, pp. 2826-2830. DOI: 10.1016/j.corsci.2009.008 3.Mordyuk B.N., Prokopenko G.I. Ultrasonic impact peening for the surface properties' management. Journal of Sound and Vibration, 2007, vol. 308, iss. 3-5, pp. 855-866. DOI: 10.1016/j.jsv.2007.03.054 4.Baraz V.P., Kartak B.P., Mineeva O.N. Special features of friction hardening of austenitic steel with unstable gamma-phase. Metal Science and Heat Treatment, 2011, vol. 52, iss. 9-10, pp. 473-475. DOI: 10.1007/s11041-010-9302-x 5.Hajian M., Abdollah-zadeh A., Rezaei-Nejad S.S., Assadi H., Hadavi S.M.M., Chung K., Shokouhimehr M. Improvement in cavitation erosion resistance of AISI 316L stainless steel by friction stir processing.