The objective in this study was to evaluate the effects of dietary CP and dried citrus pulp (DCP, rapidly fermentable carbohydrate source) contents on growth performance of weanling pigs. A total of 108 barrows weaned at 21 d of age were blocked by initial BW (5.82 ± 0.96 kg) and randomly assigned to 4 treatments with 9 replicate pens per treatment and 3 pigs per pen. Treatments were arranged in a 2 × 2 factorial, with 2 CP contents (HCP and LCP; high- and low-CP diets, respectively) and 2 DCP contents (0 and 7.5%, as-fed basis). The HCP treatments consisted of feeding 20 and 21% CP diets (as-fed basis) throughout the pre-starter I (1 to 14 d) and pre-starter II (15 to 28 d) phases, respectively. For the LCP treatments, CP contents were 16 and 17% for the pre-starter I and II diets, respectively. The AA contents in the diets were balanced by supplementation with crystalline AA, such as L-Lys, DL-Met, L-Thr, L-Trp, L-Val, and L-Ile to maintain an ideal AA pattern. Ideal AA ratios (standardized ileal digestible basis) were: 100% Lys; 28% Met; 63% Thr; 18% Trp; 69% Val; and 55% Ile. Individual pig BW and pen feed disappearance were recorded weekly to determine ADG, ADFI, and G:F. Data were analyzed as repeated measures using the MIXED procedure of SAS, with pen and block as the random effects and CP, DCP, day, and 2-way and 3-way interactions as the fixed effects. There were no CP x DCP interactions for BW, ADG, ADFI, and G:F; thus, the main effects are discussed. Growth performance was not affected by the dietary DCP contents. Even though BW and ADFI did not differ between dietary CP contents during the 28-d feeding period, pigs fed the LCP-diet showed decreased ADG (P = 0.03) and G:F (P = 0.02) from d 21 to 28 post-weaning compared with those fed the HCP-diet. However, overall ADG and G:F were not affected by reducing the dietary CP content. In conclusion, feeding diets containing 7.5% DCP to weanling pigs does not affect growth performance. Moreover, dietary CP content in pig pre-starter diets may be reduced by 4 percentage units when combined with AA supplementation without depressing overall growth performance.