The invention discloses a rare earth additive for hard alloy. The rare earth additive for hard alloy is rare earth-binder phase alloy powder with a granularity smaller than 10mum, and the weight percentage of components of the raw materials are as follows: 60-99 percent of binder phase raw material and 1-40 percent of rare earth, wherein the binder phase raw material is formed by Co, Mn and M, and M is at least one out of Ni, Fe, Cr, V, Cu and Al. Two preparation methods are available for the rare earth additive. The first preparation method comprises the steps of casting the binder phase raw material and the rare earth into ingot, smashing the ingot into blocks with size smaller than 20mm, performing homogenizing annealing to the blocks under vacuum condition, or performing rapid quenching to the blocks in an electric-arc remelting rapid quenching furnace to form a rare earth-binder phase alloy thin strip and performing hydrogen absorption, and carrying out ball-milling smashing to the product treated by hydrogen absorption under the protection of argon. The second preparation method comprises the steps of casting the binder phase raw material and the rare earth into ingot, smashing the ingot into blocks with size smaller than 20mm, and performing atomization to the alloy blocks after the alloy blocks are smelted into alloy melts, so as to form atomized powder.