Written by Adams, Michael Kamen, and Robert John "Mutt" Lange, the power ballad was the lead single for both the soundtrack album from the 1991 film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Adams's sixth studio album, Waking Up the Neighbours (1991).

[3] It went on to sell more than 15 million copies worldwide, making it Adams's most successful song, and one of the best-selling singles of all time.

[5] The song was written in London, UK at the studio Adams was working at in 1990, and he and Lange wrote it in 45 minutes, recording it the following March, and releasing it three months later.

[7] In the United Kingdom, "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" had the longest unbroken run at number one, spending sixteen consecutive weeks at the top of the UK Singles Chart from July 7, 1991, to October 27 when it dropped to number four,[8] surpassing the record 11 weeks set by Slim Whitman's hit single "Rose Marie" in 1955.

The video was filmed in a forest with the derelict silk mill near Holford in the Quantock Hills and on a beach with geological cliff formations near Kilve, Somerset.

"[21] As recently as July 2020, it placed at number 13 on YouTube's "Most Listened to Rock Countdown", a monthly tally of the most viewed and listened to songs of the rock genre, both in current release and from the past; this was the second highest song by Adams' after "Please Forgive Me" at number 10.

The Irish band Fatima Mansions released a heavily altered cover of the song as part of an NME tribute album in aid of the charity, the Spastics Society.

Producer David Foster reworked the arrangement of the original song, with Dean Parks playing the acoustic guitar.