One of the world’s biggest miners has boosted its earnings after elevated production of iron ore and copper benefited from better commodity prices.

Rio Tinto, which is one of Australia’s biggest corporate tax and royalties payers after handing over $9.5 billion in 2025, has reported a 47 per cent jump in bottom-line net profit to $US6.7 billion ($A9.6 billion).

Its underlying earnings totalled $US6.9 billion ($A9.9 billion), which was better than market expectations of about $US6.6 billion ($A9.5 billion), for the half year ended June 30.

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Rio Tinto boss Simon Trott said the results were a “step change” in the performance of the group, reflecting strong interim production and sales.

“Our strong performance is underpinned by accelerating productivity across the business,” he said on Wednesday, referring to cost savings and efficiencies.

“We have already banked $US870 million ($A1.2 billion) of productivity benefits and are on track to reach an annualised run-rate of $US1.8 billion ($A2.6 billion) by year-end, with significantly more to come.”

In the half, free cash flow surged 75 per cent to $US3.83 billion ($A5.50 billion), helped by a three per cent increase in copper equivalent production.

Earlier this month, Rio Tinto reported that its Pilbara iron ore assets in Western Australia had their best first half in eight years, delivering a six per cent increase to 162.3 million tonnes compared to the same time last year.

First-half group copper production totalled 442 kilotonnes while lithium output jumped 53 per cent to 27.3kt.

Rio Tinto declared an interim dividend of $US2.11 per share, which was lower than market expectations of about $US2.17, although it was 43 per cent higher than that for the same period last year.

-with AAP