A heat-assisted magnetic recording media structure with exchange-coupled composite layer structure may be utilized in a data storage device. The heat-assisted magnetic recording disk structure can have a FePt-based layer as a storage layer and a FePt-based or a CoPt-based magnetic layer with higher Curie temperature as a write layer. The interface between the write layer and the storage layer may be separated by an exchange control layer. The composite structure can be optimized to reduce jitter for high density data storage by tuning the exchange coupling between the write layer and storage layer.