To the best of our knowledge, the influence of the minimum wage on poverty in Russia has never before been investigated. Russian data provide a unique opportunity for studying the poverty effects related to the minimum wage due to the significant increases of the minimum wage in recent years, almost complete coverage, and a high representation of full-time workers in poor households. This paper examines the effect of the minimum wage in Russia on the incidence of poverty and transitions into and out of poverty using data from the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey of Higher School of Economics (RLMS-HSE) for the years 2006 to 2011. The results indicate slight poverty-reducing effects of the minimum wage in Russia.