Who Gives, Where and How: A 2026 Look at Donor Segments

By Jennifer Rogers-Givens · September 30, 2026 · 8 min read

Fundraising
Nonprofit
Strategy

Americans gave a record $617.2 billion to charity in 2025. Yet only 76% of adults gave money at all, the lowest share in 25 years. More dollars are coming from fewer people, and those people don't all give the same way.

That's why a single donor profile no longer works. Where people give, what they give, and how they want to be asked shift by age, by community, and by income. Below is what the latest research says about each, and what it means for your plan.

Where the money goes

Giving USA's 2026 report shows how the $617.2 billion was spread across causes in 2025. Religion is still the largest category, but it grew the slowest. Education, public-society benefit and environment causes grew fastest.

Cause	2025 giving	Change from 2024
Religion	$151.6B	+2.4%
Human services	$99.5B	+5.3%
Education	$92.0B	+11.7%
Public-society benefit	$72.1B	+11.6%
Health	$61.4B	+6.1%
International affairs	$33.0B	+4.1%
Arts, culture and humanities	$27.3B	+7.5%
Environment and animals	$24.6B	+11.0%

Individuals gave about 64% of the total ($394.2 billion), with foundations, bequests and corporations making up the rest. Bequests grew fastest of any source, up 19.7%.

The takeaway for smaller nonprofits: growth is real, but it's concentrated. Blackbaud Institute found that organizations under $1 million saw revenue fall about 6.4% in 2025, while those over $10 million grew about 11.7%. Knowing exactly who your donors are matters more when the overall pie isn't growing evenly.

By generation: who gives, to what, and how

Older adults are still the most likely to give money. Gallup found 81% of adults 55 and older gave last year, compared with 69% of adults 18 to 34. But that's only part of the picture.

	Ages 18 to 34	Ages 35 to 54	Ages 55+
Gave to a religious organization	28%	37%	53%
Gave to another charity	62%	72%	73%
Volunteered for a non-religious cause	48%	64%	51%

Source: Gallup, December 2025 survey

Boomers and older: loyal, and they want proof

Older donors drive religious giving and are the most likely to give at year-end, according to Church Mutual. In Bloomerang's 2026 Giving Signals Report, 70% of Boomers ranked clear financial reporting as the top sign of an effective nonprofit, and more than half still prefer direct mail.

Gen X: open to something new

Gen X often gets overlooked. Bloomerang found 52% of Gen X donors are looking for a new cause to support. That's a group ready to hear from you if you reach out.

Millennials: the growth generation

75% of Millennials plan to give more this year, compared with 49% of Gen X and 36% of Boomers and older. 80% plan to give to at least one nonprofit they haven't supported before (Bloomerang).

Among wealthy donors, Bank of America found Gen Z and Millennials support an average of 12 causes, compared with 8 overall. They're also far more likely to give through charitable trusts (47% vs. 5% of Boomer and older donors) and family foundations (24% vs. 2%).

Gen Z: generous, just not always in dollars

Gen Z gives in more ways than a single survey question captures. GivingTuesday and GoFundMe found upwards of 70% of Gen Z reported some form of giving in a given week, including time, advocacy and direct help to people. 63% told Give.org they might give more if asked, and nearly 60% of Gen Z and Millennials learn about charities on social media, compared with 18% of Boomers.

By race and ethnicity: the generosity surveys miss

A quick note on the data first. There's no 2026 national study with detailed giving numbers by race and ethnicity. The best sources are from Indiana University's Lilly Family School of Philanthropy and Pew Research Center, covering 2018 to 2023. We've noted the year on each finding.

Gaps follow income, not generosity

Gallup's 2025 survey found 75% of White adults gave to a non-religious charity, compared with 59% of other adults. But the same survey shows the bigger driver is income: 52% of adults in households under $50,000 gave to a non-religious charity, compared with 84% in households earning $100,000 or more.

Indiana University's Everyday Donors of Color study (2021) found the same thing. Once income and education are accounted for, there is no statistically significant difference in giving rates across racial and ethnic groups.

Black donors give a larger share of income

From 2000 to 2018, Black households gave the largest share of their income to charity in most years, 3.0% in 2018 compared with 2.9% for White households, despite a large wealth gap (Lilly Family School, 2023). Faith and community are central. In a 2024 study of faith giving, 71% of predominantly Black congregations ranked serving the local community as a top priority, compared with 58% of White congregations.

Hispanic and Latino donors give to family and community

Formal charitable giving among Latino households dropped over the last two decades, but that's not the full story. Hispanics in Philanthropy and the Lilly Family School (2023) found Latino households gave informally, to family, neighbors and community, at higher rates than other households. Top causes match everyone else's: congregations, basic needs, health and education.

Asian American donors give here and abroad

Pew Research Center (2024) found 64% of Asian Americans gave to a U.S. charity in the past year, 20% gave to a charity in their family's country of origin, and 27% sent money to someone there. Much of that generosity never shows up in U.S. nonprofit data.

Trust and the direct ask

Indiana University's research found donors in Black, Hispanic and Asian American communities more often give directly to people they know, and more often through crowdfunding: 34% of the donors in that study give this way in a typical year. In 2020, Asian (30.7%) and Black (19.3%) donors were also more likely than White donors (12.6%) to give to racial and social justice causes.

The pattern across every group: people give where they have relationships and trust. Organizations that show up in a community, consistently, earn that trust.

How donors give

The channel matters as much as the cause. A few patterns hold across every group:

Email is still the favorite. 69% of donors prefer to hear from nonprofits by email, and it's the top channel across every generation (Bloomerang).
Online keeps growing. Online revenue rose 15% in 2025 for nonprofits in the M+R Benchmarks Study. Monthly giving made up 27% of it, and 71% of monthly donors were still giving a year later.
Donor-advised funds are booming. Fidelity Charitable donors recommended $18.3 billion in grants in 2025, up 23%. 77% of those grants went to charities the donor had supported before.
Crowdfunding is a real channel. GoFundMe saw more than 47 million donations to individual fundraisers in 2025, compared with 32 million to nonprofits. That's where a lot of informal, relationship-based giving happens.
Specifics win. 94% of donors are more motivated when told exactly where their money will go (Bloomerang).

Segment	How they tend to give	What they want from you
Boomers and older	Direct mail, year-end gifts, faith giving	Clear financial reporting
Gen X	Email, online, open to new causes	A reason to switch to you
Millennials	Online, monthly, DAFs, many causes at once	Specific impact and an easy way to give more
Gen Z	Time, advocacy, direct help, social media	To be asked, and something to share
Communities giving through relationships	Family, faith and crowdfunding	Trust, presence and a personal ask

What to do with this

You don't need a separate campaign for every group. You need to know who's actually on your list, and make a few smart adjustments.

Look at your own data first. Sort your donors by age range, giving channel and gift size. Most nonprofits find their list looks different than they assumed.
Keep proof front and center for longtime donors. Clear financial updates and year-end mail still matter to older donors who carry a large share of your revenue.
Make monthly and DAF giving easy. Millennials are ready to give more. A monthly option and clear DAF instructions remove friction.
Ask younger supporters directly. Gen Z wants to be asked and wants something to share. Volunteering and advocacy are often their first step.
Show up before you ask. In communities where giving runs through family, faith and trusted relationships, consistent presence comes before the gift. Partner with local leaders and congregations, and let community voices tell the story.
Be specific in every ask. Name what a gift does, in every channel, for every group.

Want to know who your donors really are, and how to reach the communities you serve? That's the work we do every day. Start a conversation with P Three Consulting, or download our free 2026 Nonprofit Insights Reports for more of the research.

Sources

Giving USA 2026: The Annual Report on Philanthropy for the Year 2025, Giving USA Foundation, June 2026
Gallup charitable giving survey, December 2025, released January 2026
Bloomerang and The Harris Poll, 2026 Giving Signals Report, May 2026
Bank of America Private Bank, 2026 Study of Wealthy Americans, September 2026
BBB Wise Giving Alliance, Donor Trust Report 2026, May 2026
Give.org, Gen Z charitable giving, 2026
GoFundMe and GivingTuesday Data Commons, Gen Z giving research, May 2026
Church Mutual, 2026 Charitable Giving in America, January 2026
Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, Everyday Donors of Color, August 2021
Lilly Family School, Giving Trends by Race and Ethnicity, November 2023
Hispanics in Philanthropy and Lilly Family School, Latinx Philanthropy, September 2023
Pew Research Center, Asian Americans' charitable giving and remittances, May 2024
The Chronicle of Philanthropy, on Givelify and Lake Institute faith giving research, March 2024
Blackbaud Institute 2025 giving data, March 2026
M+R Benchmarks 2026, April 2026
Fidelity Charitable 2026 Giving Report, March 2026
GoFundMe 2025 Year in Help, December 2025