Abstract As CMOS technology continues to advance and scale down, conventional post-metallization annealing (PMA), conducted to enhance yield and device performance, needs to evolve due to its excessively high thermal stress and long duration. In this context, this study proposes rapid deuterium annealing (RDA) as an alternative to conventional PMA for minimizing the thermal budget. Compared to conventional PMA, the RDA process shortened the annealing time from 30 min to 3 min, thereby effectively reducing the thermal budget. High- k metal gate MOSFETs are fabricated for process verification, and the impact of RDA is investigated through device characterization. After the RDA process, device performance and stress immunity have been enhanced through passivation of interface traps.