[3] Schweinsteiger played youth football for FV Oberaudorf (two spells), his hometown club TSV 1860 Rosenheim, Austrian side FC Kufstein and SpVgg Unterhaching before being released in 2001.

Schweinsteiger made an immediate impact for Lübeck, scoring within one minute of coming on as a substitute on his debut to secure a 1–0 victory over rivals Holstein Kiel.

He formed an effective strike partnership with Lars Kampf, with the pair scoring eleven goals each as the club narrowly missed out on promotion to the 2.

In the summer of 2005, Lübeck signed forwards Kai Hesse and Enrico Neitzel, and this increased competition meant that Schweinsteiger was often used as a substitute, but still managed to score seven goals.

Lübeck experienced a repeat of last season's league position, finishing third again, although Schweinsteiger was to ascend to the second division, signing for Eintracht Braunschweig in July 2006.

[5] This proved to be one of only three wins for Braunschweig as they were relegated from the second tier, finishing in last place, by which point Schweinsteiger had found himself less in favour, restricted to mostly substitute appearances in the second half of the season.

After just a year with Braunschweig, Schweinsteiger returned to VfB Lübeck, but this time lasted only six months—he was part of a large exodus in January 2008, after a poor start to the season made it clear that they wouldn't be able to qualify for the new 3.

Schweinsteiger made his Unterhaching debut in a local derby against Bayern Munich II, coming on as a substitute for Thomas Rathgeber and scoring the second goal in a 4–2 win.

Unterhaching were forced to cut costs, and Schweinsteiger was one of a number of senior players to leave, joining another of his former clubs, Jahn Regensburg.

Along with Stefan Buck and Altin Lala, Tobias was one of three experienced players brought in by coach Mehmet Scholl to help the young team in their bid to earn promotion to the 3.

[11] After a disappointing first half of the 2012–13 season, he returned to SpVgg Unterhaching on a six-month loan in January 2013, as a replacement for the outgoing Florian Niederlechner.