The beginning of organized sports in Bijeljina and Semberija was marked by soccer. The first soccer ball was brought to this area, in 1916, by the Austro Hungarian soldiers that demonstrated until then an
unknown game of "foot and ball" on their military grounds.

Already in 1919, the first soccer club -Podhnje (i.e. the Drina River Basin) -was founded and, in 1935, the soccer club Semberija as well. There were also sports
clubs Viktorija, Slaven and Bijeljinski and, since 1938, Radnički (i.e. Workers) as well the   predecessor   of   today's   Radnik   (i.e.Worker).

After the Second World War, a strong development of sports and physical culture started, togethter with the construction of important sports centers. Newly built sports center in Bijeljina, Janja and Dvorovi, sports halls in Bijeljina and in all the elementary schools, the Olympic swimming pool in Dvorovi - have become a strong material basis for mass development of sports.

Radnik soccer club, founded in 1945, today competes with a great success. From the ranks of the soccer club Podrinje from Janja,Savo Milošević left home for the  international soccer stage, the famous national goal getter who won and built up his reputation in Belgrade, Italy, Great Britain and Spain. A lot of other devotees of "the most important secondary thing in the world" followed his steps.

Apart from soccer, basketball, team-handball, volleyball, chess and, in the recent years, increasingly marshal arts are developing, in which the athletes of Bijeljina have achieved valuable results on an international scale. The names of karate players Milan Lazić, Dragiša Jović, Dražen Stojanović, Maja Birčaković and others became famous much farther from Bijeljina, the Republic of Srpska and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Nowdays, in the municipality of Bijeljina there are 70 sports clubs in 19 sports with over 4 thousand active athletes. They have 85 outdoor and 3 indoor sports grounds at their disposal.
The town Bijeljina also established its name as a successful organizer of a large number of sports events, among which particularly stands out the Festival of Small Olympic Games with almost 4 thousand participants.