The exercise-induced inflammatory response is a fundamental and crucial process that mediates recovery, regeneration and adaptation to exercise stress. The inflammatory response following exercise depends on the overall characteristics of exercise such as type, duration, intensity and volume. Acute muscle damaging eccentric exercise induces a profound increase in pro-inflammatory cytokines, which is essential for clearing cellular debris and initiate the healing process. Following this pro-inflammatory phase, anti-inflammatory cytokines promote tissue repair through their interaction with other cell types leading to muscle adaptation and growth. Resistance and endurance exercise have been also shown to trigger an inflammatory response but their profile may differ. Resistance exercise-induced inflammation is increased following a bout of exercise, with chronic resistance exercise inducing positive adaptations to the inflammatory profile. Endurance exercise initiates an inflammatory response of lower magnitude and may lead to transient immunosuppression responses. Notably, chronic resistance and endurance exercise can promote an anti-inflammatory phenotype that can mitigate excessive inflammation and upregulate tissue recovery and adaptation. Participation in team sports also results in an increase of the inflammatory response, with soccer eliciting a more intense and prolonged inflammatory response compared to other sport disciplines. Collectively, the inflammatory response to exercise is a complex and dynamic process, playing an important role in regeneration, recovery and adaptation to exercise.