 In a contemporary review for "Rolling Stone", music critic Lester Bangs called "Hot August Night" a "fine presentation of the entire spectrum" of Diamond's work and praised its music as "great, pretentious, goofy pop" with a melodramatic, "hymn-like feeling".In a retrospective review, Allmusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine called "Hot August Night" "the ultimate Neil Diamond record ... [which] shows Diamond the icon in full glory.