Surface coating of the present invention, the cutting tool is a WC-based cemented carbide or TiCN-based tool surface coated cutting tool is deposited to form a hard coat layer of the lower layer and the upper layer on the substrate made of a cermet, (a) the lower layer is at least one layer of TiCN layer is composed of a configured Ti compound layer, (b) the top layer, if one made and, (c) measuring, constituting atom sharing lattice point distribution for the whole upper layer Al ₂ O ₃ grains with α-type Al ₂ O ₃ layer, Σ3 the highest peak present in, and also the distribution ratio of Σ3 is more than 70%, (d) of Σ3 corresponding grain boundaries of the top layer, the lower layer and the Σ3 ratio of the corresponding grain boundary contiguous to the outermost surface of the top layer from the interface of the top layer at least 60% and, also preferably, the top layer of the lower layer is composed of an oxygen-containing TiCN layer, in the case of measuring the inclination angle frequency distribution for the Al ₂ O ₃ crystal grains of the upper layer, from 0 to 10 degrees, tilt angle Frequency ratio of Al ₂ O ₃ grains in the classification is 70% or more, and aspect ratio of 5 or more Al ₂ O ₃ area ratio of crystal grains of the upper layer is 80% or more.