An intensified oxidative acid leaching of copper–cadmium-bearing slag featuring using high-efficient oxygen carrier, such as activated carbon, was investigated to achieve high leaching rate of valuable metals. The effects of leaching variables, including agitation rate, sulfuric acid concentration, temperature, slag particle size, activated carbon and cupric ion concentration, were examined. It is found that leaching rates of cadmium and zinc both exceed 99 % in a very short time, but for copper, leaching rate of 99 % is achieved under the optimized leaching parameters, which are agitation rate of 100 r·min−1, sulfuric acid concentration of 15 wt%, leaching temperature of 80 °C, slag particle size of 48–75 μm, activated carbon concentration of 3 g·L−1, liquid-to-solid ratio of 4:1, oxygen flow rate of 0.16 L·min−1, and leaching time of 60 min. The macro-leaching kinetics of copper metal was analyzed, and it is concluded that the inner diffusion is the controlling step, with apparent activation energy of 18.6 kJ·mol−1. The leaching solution with pH value of 2–4 can be designed to selectively extract valuable metals without neutralization, and the leaching residue can be treated by prevailing Pb smelting process. The phase compositions of the leaching residue are PbSO4 and CaSO4. And the chemical composition analysis result shows that about 13 % Pb is contained in the residue, which can be recycled by Pb smelting technology in an Isa furnace. The way is that the Pb-containing concentrate and the PbSO4-containing leaching residue can be mixed and placed in the furnace.