[5] Fred Thomas of AllMusic rated Are We There four-out-of-five stars, in particular praising the album's "inventive arrangements and advances in songwriting", which he referred to as "an undeniable step forward for Van Etten".

[2] In Rolling Stone, Will Hermes also rated Are We There four-out-of-five stars, writing that "like Nick Cave, [Van Etten's] darkness contains multitudes" and calling the album "magnificent" and one "which grows her trademark examinations of romantic decay to cathedral-like scale.

Club's Emily St. James summarized that "Are We There offers an artist in full command of her voice and her instrument" and called it a "punishing epic of an album, intense and bruised and haunted", ultimately awarding it an A− rating.

[6] Pitchfork writer Stephen M. Deusner called Are We There "the peak of a steady upward trajectory", describing how it was more "self-determined and self-directed" than Van Etten's previous albums, Because I Was in Love (2009), Epic (2010) and Tramp (2012).

[16] In 2019, Pitchfork ranked Are We There at number 174 on their list of "The 200 Best Albums of the 2010s"; contributing editor Jayson Greene wrote: "Are We There was a great deepening—of Sharon Van Etten’s emotional range, of the power of her songwriting, and of the potency of her voice.