Does removing the XMRig donation affect mining performance?

Removing XMRig’s developer donation does not normally make your processor mine faster. It can give you slightly more mining time for your own pool, but the gain is small: at a 1% donation level, removing it would increase your own mining time by about 1.01%, assuming everything else stays the same.

What the donation actually uses

XMRig is mining software that uses your computer to help secure Monero and earn mining rewards. Its developer donation supports the people who maintain the software.

The donation works by occasionally directing your mining work to the developers’ donation pool instead of your chosen pool. A pool combines work from many miners and shares the rewards.

It does not normally take a percentage out of your wallet or deduct coins you have already earned. Instead, it uses a small share of your mining time.

At a 1% donation level, that works out to roughly:

• 99% of your mining time working for your configured destination.
• 1% working for the developers.

Those percentages describe the intended split over time, not necessarily every short session you watch.

Mining speed versus rewards credited to you

Your hashrate is the number of mining calculations your computer performs each second. Removing the donation does not improve your processor, memory speed, or cooling, so you should not expect a higher raw hashrate.

What can change is how much of that work goes toward your rewards.

For example, moving from 99 units of personal mining time to 100 units is an increase of about 1.01%. That is a small improvement in work directed to you—not a guaranteed 1.01% increase in the payout you see tomorrow.

Short-term pool results vary because finding valid mining work involves luck. Your actual earnings also depend on network competition, pool fees, and payout rules. Check a live mining calculator for estimates rather than treating this percentage as a fixed earnings promise.

Donation switching can involve connection or job-change overhead, but removing it is not a reliable route to a meaningful speed boost.

Why your configuration matters

In standard official XMRig builds, the donation setting normally has a minimum of 1%. Setting the donation level to zero in a configuration file does not necessarily disable it; the software can still enforce its minimum.

Completely removing the donation generally requires changing the source code—the human-readable instructions behind the program—and compiling your own version.

Be cautious about downloaded “zero-donation” builds. An unknown version could redirect your work, steal information, or contain malware. A claimed 1% saving is not worth handing control of your computer to an untrusted program.

What matters more for performance

For Monero’s RandomX mining algorithm—the rules your computer follows to do mining work—hardware and configuration usually matter more than the donation.

Before focusing on that small percentage, check:

• Whether your processor is slowing down because it is too hot.
• Whether XMRig reports that its recommended memory settings are working.
• Whether your thread count, meaning how many mining workers run at once, suits your processor.
• Whether electricity costs outweigh your rewards.

Compare results over a sustained period under similar conditions, not just a few seconds.

The bottom line

Removing XMRig’s donation can slightly increase the work credited to you, but it does not normally increase mining speed. At the standard 1% level, the potential benefit is small, and trusted software plus a well-tuned setup usually deserve your attention first.