Objectives <p>This study evaluated the impact of Compassionate Mind Training (CMT) on mental health in the Chinese college students and to compare the effects of CMT with and without mindfulness using a component analysis approach.</p> Method <p>Seventy-two college students were randomly assigned to two 8-week intervention groups: CMT and CMT Minus Mindfulness (CMM), and a wait-list control group, with 24 participants in each group. Participants completed a series of self-report questionnaires at pre-intervention, post-intervention, and 6-month follow-up.</p> Results <p>The results of two-way repeated-measures ANOVA showed that there were no significant differences between the two intervention groups across all outcomes. However, both CMT and CMM groups achieved significant improvements in a range of variables compared to the wait-list control group. Additionally, the pre- and follow-up paired sample <i>t</i>-test results indicated that participants in both intervention groups showed improvements across a range of variables. However, in this sample, no significant differences were found in the direct comparison between the two intervention groups.</p> Conclusions <p>Both the CMT and CMM interventions showed positive outcomes across multiple variables, indicating that they can effectively improve the mental health of college students. Nevertheless, it still requires future studies with larger sample sizes and rigorous research designs to compare the efficacy of the two interventions.</p> Preregistration <p>This study is not preregistered.</p>