Polyolefin plastics play an important role in both production and life due to the excellent characteristics, such as east processing, low price and outstanding performance. It has become the most widely used plastics at present. The main raw materials of polyolefin plastics are non-renewable resources such as coal and oil. Waste polyolefin plastics are difficult to degrade in the natural environment, and will break into small particles. The micro plastics are transferred into lakes, rivers, oceans and soil, which will cause serious impact and damage to the environment and the health of animals and plants. Therefore, in terms of energy conservation and environmental protection, the recycling of polyolefin plastics is a very important topic. Among the recycling methods of polyolefin plastics, oxidative degradation can effectively degrade macromolecular polyolefin plastics to generate high-value small molecule chemical raw materials, realize the recycling and high-value utilization of polyolefin plastics, and provide a good solution to the existing micro plastic pollution problem in the environment. In this paper, the oxidative degradation of polyolefin plastics is studied, and the research progress related to the oxidative degradation in recent years is summarized. The reaction process, oxidation mechanism and degradation products of three oxidative degradation methods, chemical oxidative degradation, biological oxidative degradation and photooxidative degradation, are analyzed and discussed. Based on the current research situation, the development prospect of the oxidative degradation and recovery of polyolefin plastics in the future is also prospected.