🔧Improve Your DOT Staking

Checklist to get the most out of your DOT direct stake

When staking on Polkadot directly, you may notice over time that your DOT rewards are lower than they used to be, not as consistent, or even not coming at all. Here are the things you should check to keep your DOT stake effective and your rewards high.

Are your validators still perfect for you?

Since you picked your validators, some of them may have raised their commission, misbehaved, or become oversubscribed. All of these puts your staking rewards at risk. We recommend reviewing and updating your validators from time to time.

Do you compound your rewards?

Your staking rewards are maximized when you auto-compound them. By default, Nova sets your DOT rewards to auto-compound, but you may have chosen to receive them as free balance to any of your accounts. Check your DOT reward destination and change it if needed.

Do you have any unpaid rewards?

DOT rewards are usually paid out within 2–3 days. Your validators usually make the payouts as part of their service, but anyone can do that. If some of your recent rewards are missing, maybe they haven't been paid out just yet. To see your pending rewards, select Unpaid rewards on your Polkadot Staking screen. If your validator neglects the payout for too long and your rewards are about to expire, you can pay them out yourself.

Should you stake more DOT?

The minimum DOT stake is dynamic: when more people start staking DOT directly, the minimum amount goes up. Over time, you may find your stake inactive as the minimum rises above it. Nova will alert you if you need to stake more. To start earning DOT rewards again, you can either:

• Tap the alert to add more DOT to your stake, or

• Unstake and switch to pool staking, which requires a much lower minimum.

Is your account perfectly positioned in the queue?

Under the hood, Polkadot ranges stakers based loosely on their stake. As your stake grows through auto-compounding, your account's position may be manually improved. Nova will alert you if you can move up in the queue. Tap the alert and confirm the transaction to improve your account's position.