How Changing Your Wallet Affects Staking and Block Rewards

Changing the wallet address linked to your IO.net account affects different parts of the system in different ways. Here's a detailed breakdown of what changes, what doesn't, and why.

1️⃣ Staking Is Permanently Linked to the Original Wallet

When you stake IO tokens to a worker, the blockchain binds that stake to the wallet address used during the staking transaction. This binding is immutable — it cannot be changed later, even if the wallet in your IO.net account is updated.

Why this matters:

• Withdrawals can only be made to the initial staking wallet.
• If a user loses access to their original wallet, they cannot withdraw their stake, even if their account wallet is updated.
• Changing the wallet in the UI only affects future distributions, not past or blockchain-level actions.

  
  

2️⃣ Block Rewards & Airdrops Are Wallet-Dependent (With Timing Sensitivity)

• If a wallet is updated before the snapshot/announcement or distribution trigger → rewards go to the new wallet.
• If the wallet is updated after snapshot/distribution → rewards were already routed to the old wallet.
• Even if the old wallet is removed from your account, the rewards will still go there, since the system uses the saved state at the time of snapshot.

Changing your wallet does not move previous rewards or airdrops. Any rewards already distributed before the change will remain tied to the old wallet.

3️⃣ No Automatic Transfer of Past Rewards

Many users believe that if they change their wallet, past airdrops or rewards will be "forwarded" to the new address — this is not possible.

Clarification

• Tokens already sent to the old wallet cannot be redirected or recovered through IO.net support.
• If a user lost access to the old wallet, those tokens are unfortunately unrecoverable.
• This is a Solana blockchain limitation, not an IO.net platform limitation.
  
  

If a wallet address is entered incorrectly (e.g., missing characters or formatting errors), rewards may fail to be delivered without any visible error. Always ensure the wallet address is complete and valid before saving.