[5][6] According to journalist Bill Harry, McCartney thought of the lyrics whilst shaving: "I wrote 'All My Loving' like a piece of poetry and then, I think, I put a song to it later".

"All My Loving" was the Beatles' opening number on their debut performance on The Ed Sullivan Show February 9, 1964;[15] the recording was included on Anthology 1 (1995).

According to Alan Weiss, a TV producer who happened to be there, "All My Loving" was playing on the sound system at Roosevelt Hospital emergency room when Lennon was pronounced dead after being shot on December 8, 1980.

[17] Among the critics who have praised the song, Ian MacDonald said, "The innocence of early Sixties British pop is perfectly distilled in the eloquent simplicity of this number".

[4] Richie Unterberger of AllMusic said it "was arguably the best LP-only track the Beatles did before 1964" and that if it had been released as a single in America it would have been a huge hit.

[18] Mark Lewisohn wrote in his The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions book that the song was "magnificent ... by far [McCartney's] best, most complex piece of songwriting yet".1988 Harrison's concise solo has been described as reminiscent of Chet Atkins,[19] and Lennon's complex rhythm work (relying on the unusual use of constant triplets[20]) was referred to as "the most recognizable feature"[21] of the song; Lennon himself later described his performance as "a superb piece of guitar.