Staking Reward Calculator

Growth over your staking period

Key numbers

Real yield health

How compounding frequency changes your yield

Using your current rate as a nominal APR, here's the effective APY and final balance at different compounding frequencies over your staking period.

Typical staking yield ranges by category

Illustrative bands commonly cited across proof-of-stake networks, not specific current rates for any coin — always check the live rate on your chosen network or platform before staking.

Understanding staking rewards

Staking is how proof-of-stake blockchains pay for security: validators lock up tokens as collateral, and in exchange for validating transactions honestly, the network pays them newly issued tokens plus a share of fees. Most holders don't run a validator directly — they delegate through a wallet, an exchange, or a liquid staking protocol and receive a share of the rewards, usually net of a commission.

Where n is the number of times per year the rate compounds. This calculator's main tab runs whichever formula matches the rate type you select — APY is treated as already including compounding and applied directly across your staking period, while APR is compounded using the frequency you choose.

APR vs. APY: the distinction that trips people up

APR is the simple, uncompounded annual rate — rewards are paid but don't automatically start earning their own rewards. APY includes the effect of compounding, so it's always equal to or higher than the equivalent APR at the same nominal rate. Native validator staking (directly bonding tokens to a validator) commonly quotes APR, since claiming and restaking is often a manual step. Liquid staking tokens that auto-compound, like receipt tokens from major liquid staking protocols, commonly quote APY instead. Comparing a platform's APR straight against another platform's APY understates or overstates the real difference between them — convert both to the same basis before comparing.

Why compounding frequency matters more than it seems

A 10% nominal APR compounded annually stays at exactly 10% APY. The same 10% compounded daily works out to about 10.52% APY — small on its own, but it compounds further over multi-year horizons and matters more at higher rates. A 20% APR compounded daily reaches roughly 22.13% APY, a meaningfully larger gap. Check the compounding frequency table further down this page using your own numbers.

Validator and platform commission

The rate a network pays for validating isn't the rate you receive — your validator or platform takes a commission first. A 6% quoted rate with a 10% commission leaves you an effective 5.4% (6% × (1 − 10%)). Commission rates vary widely by validator and platform, so always check the net rate after commission, not the gross network rate, when comparing options.

Real yield: separating growth from dilution

Many proof-of-stake networks fund staking rewards largely through inflation — minting new tokens and paying them to stakers. If the network's supply grows by 8% a year and your staking APY is 12%, you're not actually growing your share of the network by the full 12%; a large part of that yield is simply keeping pace with new issuance. Real yield strips this out.

This is the Fisher equation applied to staking: at a 12% nominal APY and 8% network inflation, real yield works out to roughly 3.7% — meaning your actual share of the network (and, all else equal, your claim on its value) is growing by about 3.7% a year, not 12%. A headline APY with real yield near zero, or negative, means stakers are mostly just avoiding dilution rather than gaining real ownership.

A worked example

$10,000 staked at 5% APY for one year grows to $10,500 — $500 in rewards. The same $10,000 at a 5% APR compounded daily instead reaches about $10,512.67, an extra $12.67 purely from reinvestment timing. Add a 10% validator commission to the 5% rate and the effective rate drops to 4.5%, cutting the reward to $450 on the simple basis. None of these figures account for what happens to the token's price over the same period — that's a separate, and usually much larger, factor in your dollar outcome.

Staking rewards don't protect you from price risk

Rewards are paid in the staked token, not in dollars. A 6% yield on a token that falls 30% in price over the same period still leaves you with roughly a 24% loss in dollar terms — the yield offsets only a fraction of a serious price decline, not all of it. Staking is best thought of as a way to earn a return on an asset you'd hold anyway, not as a reason by itself to buy a volatile token purely for the rate.

Lock-up periods and slashing

Many networks impose an unbonding or lock-up period between requesting a withdrawal and actually receiving your tokens back — sometimes hours, sometimes weeks — during which the price can move against you with no way to exit. Networks including Ethereum and Cosmos can also "slash" (destroy) part of a validator's stake for downtime or malicious behavior, and delegators typically share in that loss proportionally. Both are real, if generally uncommon, risks this calculator's projections don't price in.

Glossary of terms

APR (Annual Percentage Rate)

The simple, uncompounded annual staking rate — rewards don't automatically earn further rewards.

APY (Annual Percentage Yield)

The effective annual rate including the effect of compounding — always equal to or higher than the equivalent APR.

Compounding frequency

How often rewards are credited and start earning their own rewards — daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually.

Validator commission

The share of staking rewards a validator keeps before passing the rest on to delegators.

Real yield

Nominal staking APY adjusted for network token inflation, showing the actual growth in your share of the network rather than the raw reward rate.

Network inflation rate

The rate at which a proof-of-stake network increases its total token supply, typically to fund staking rewards.

Slashing

A penalty where a network destroys part of a validator's (and its delegators') stake for downtime or malicious behavior.

Unbonding period

The mandatory waiting time between requesting to unstake and actually regaining access to your tokens.

How to use this calculator

Common mistakes & tips for evaluating staking yields

• Comparing APR against APY directly. Convert both to the same basis before deciding one platform's rate beats another's.
• Ignoring commission. The advertised network rate isn't what you keep — subtract validator or platform commission first.
• Chasing the highest headline APY without checking inflation. A very high APY on a high-inflation network can have a real yield close to zero once dilution is accounted for.
• Treating staking yield as compensation for price risk. A positive yield doesn't offset a serious price decline in the underlying token — they're separate factors in your dollar return.
• Forgetting the unbonding period when you might need liquidity. A long lock-up can leave you unable to exit during exactly the period you'd most want to.
• Assuming daily compounding when rewards are actually claimed manually. Native staking often requires you to restake rewards yourself — if you don't, your real result tracks simple APR, not the compounded APY figure.

Example setups

A few realistic stake, rate and duration combinations — click one to load it into the Staking Rewards tab above.

Your saved setups

Click "💾 Save setup" above to keep the projection you're currently running — it's stored privately in this browser, not sent anywhere, so it'll be here next time you visit on this device.

Compounded (APY) vs. simple (APR) — a side-by-side example

The same $10,000 stake at an 8% rate for 3 years, once paid as simple interest and once compounded daily.

Compounding adds an extra $312.16 over the same 3 years at the same 8% nominal rate — purely from reinvesting rewards as they accrue instead of letting them sit idle. This gap only exists if rewards are actually reinvested: on platforms where you must manually restake, forgetting to do so means your real result tracks the simple figure, not the compounded one.

Frequently asked questions

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