This work indicates that the core–shell structure is expected to meet the requirements of high friction and low wear for clutches. In the article, two types of core–shell particles are added to Cu-based friction materials for tribological testing. The results showed that as the concentration increased, the coefficient of friction showed a trend of first increasing (from 0.13 to 0.67) and then decreasing (from 0.67 to 0.57). At the same concentration, the COF of carbon coated copper (Cu@C) friction material is 0.4 higher than that of copper coated carbon (C@Cu) friction material, but the wear rate is 43.1% lower. Both materials exhibit high COF but their wear behavior are different due to the distinct components of the friction film.