A mining pool is a group of cryptocurrency miners who combine their computational resources to increase their chances of successfully mining new blocks. By working together, they can solve complex mathematical problems more efficiently than individual miners. When a block is mined, the rewards are distributed among the members of the pool based on their contributed processing power. Mining pools are particularly popular in networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum, where the difficulty of mining can be quite high. Joining a pool allows smaller miners to earn a more consistent income, as they receive smaller, more frequent payouts instead of waiting for a solo mining success.