2025 Humanitarian Action
Mid-Year Benchmark
Mid-Year Benchmark
Introduction
Through the first half of 2025, many large nonprofit organizations experienced a mix of both challenges and wins in their fundraising:
- While new donor acquisition has become more expensive and unpredictable, donor retention has become more critical.
- We’ve seen strong results from optimized digital platforms, like donation pages, online experiences and mobile giving.
- Monthly giving continues to grow online revenue.
- Donor data and AI tools are empowering nonprofits to tailor outreach and personalize stewardship.
- Multichannel strategy has proven to be a powerful driver for donor acquisition and retention.
For this benchmark report, we analyzed 10 large nonprofits in the relief and development and social services spaces. This resource gives us a pulse check on how these organizations are performing. By sharing big-picture bright spots and challenges, we can see trends that one organization cannot access on its own.
RKD’s mid-year benchmark report offers a data-driven snapshot of fundraising performance from national and global humanitarian organizations. This first-of-its-kind resource represents approximately 2.4 million donors and provides valuable insights into donor behavior, revenue trends and opportunities for growth. The data offers strategic guidance to help plan effectively while sustaining the vital mission of meeting critical needs at home and abroad.
—Amanda Wasson, Executive Vice President, RKD Group
A Note from RKD's Marketing Science Team
Here is a look at our top 3 takeaways:
Funding shortages are increasing the need for donations, and donors understand. However, inflation and increased recession sentiments are driving more donors to give less, so we need to look to strong mid-, major and monthly donor relations to grow our impact. Strategically, our recommendations to optimize revenue for the remainder of 2025 are:
1. Prioritize stewardship
Stewardship is essential at every level of giving. Focus on retention, especially of multi-year donors, who made up 41% of active donors and contributed 62% of revenue under $10,000 in 2024.
As economic conditions improve and younger donor preferences evolve, strategies must shift. Storytelling, segmentation and identity-driven giving are needed to meet donor expectations.
2. Continue growing monthly donors and ask for extra gifts
RKD’s humanitarian action clients are making great progress growing their monthly donors, who now account for about 18% of giving under $10,000. As revenue from this group continues to rise, it’s crucial to keep investing in and nurturing monthly giving programs.
Additionally, extra gifts from monthly donors represent 42% of all revenue from this valuable cohort. When used at a relevant time, an incremental ask strategy can prove to be greatly beneficial.
3. Focus on major-giving portfolios
As we approach the holiday season, consider how you’re building a pipeline from direct response to major giving. Major gifts comprise 34% of all revenue—the lowest of all our verticals. Investing in major giving is a must to develop this segment.
About the report
What we measured
The 2025 Humanitarian Action Mid-Year Benchmark Report contains full-file data from 10 RKD U.S. and global humanitarian organizations, representing data from January 1, 2020, to June 30, 2025. This data includes metrics such as total revenue, active donors, average gift and gift frequency. Contributions of $10,000 or more were filtered out to provide insights into both overall revenue and direct-response revenue.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Revenue down 0.4%
From FY24 to FY25, revenue excluding gifts $10,000 or more decreased 0.4% year to date. This decline is minimal and encourages us to bolster our year-end fundraising efforts.
Revenue including $10,000+ gifts up 5.2%
Year to date, revenue including major gifts ($10,000+) grew 5.2% from 2024 to 2025. For 2025 thus far, major gifts represent 34% of revenue, mid-level gifts ($1,000 - $9,999) 14% and general gifts 52%.
Active donors down 3.2%
FY24 to FY25 YTD, the number of active donors decreased 3.2%. Active donor files have slightly contracted. This data affirms ongoing acquisition challenges.
Revenue per active donor up 2.9%
For gifts under $10,000, the revenue per donor grew 2.9% from 2024 to 2025 YTD. It’s great to see this metric grow year after year.
Average gift up 1.2%
The average gift grew 1.2%, or $0.85, from FY24 to FY25 YTD. It’s encouraging to see a new high after a few years of fluctuation.
Gift frequency up 1.7%
Comparing the first half of 2024 to that of 2025, gift frequency has increased 1.7%. This change of 0.04 is minimal yet encouraging to see year after year.
New and reactivated donors down 23.5%
New and reactivated donors decreased 13.0% from 2024 to 2025 YTD. As new donor acquisition declines, now’s a good time to focus on the value of reactivated donors and improvements for new donor acquisition.
See how other sectors performed
About RKD Group
RKD Group is the growth architect for nonprofits. We design fundraising and marketing programs that accelerate donor engagement and net revenue for your organization. We simplify complexity and scale your impact through bold strategy, creative orchestration and audience-led insights.
What does that mean exactly? Simply put: We help your fundraising thrive.
Reach out to us and discover expertly crafted, optimized fundraising.