Objective To investigate the inhibitory effect of apigenin on the activation of microglial cells.Methods Microglial cells from Sprague-Dawley rats were cultured and randomly divided into blank control group, lipopolysaccharide (LPS) group, and LPS+apigenin (10 μM, 20 μM, and 50 μM) groups. MTT assay was used to analyze the effect of apigenin on the viability of microglial cells; ELISA was used to measure the expression of inflammatory factors interleukin-1 (IL-1) and interleukin-10 (IL-10) and neurotrophic factors brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and parasite-derived neurotrophic factor (PDNF); RT-PCR and Western blot were used to measure the transcriptional and expression levels of the inflammation-related gene inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS).Results MTT assay showed that apigenin had no marked inhibitory effect on the viability of microglial cells. After LPS stimulation, the apigenin pretreatment group had significantly lower expression of IL-1 and significantly higher expression of IL-10 than the LPS group (P<0.05), and the secretion of BDNF and PDNF showed a similar trend (P<0.05). The apigenin pretreatment group also had significantly lower transcriptional and expression levels of iNOS than the LPS group (P<0.05).Conclusions Apigenin can inhibit the expression of inflammatory factors and proteins and promote the secretion of neurotrophic factors associated with neuron differentiation and maturation in microglial cells.