An accompanying music video, directed by Nigel Dick, features Spears as a high-school student who starts to sing and dance around the school, while watching her love interest from afar.

[2] Three of the labels rejected her, arguing audiences wanted pop bands such as the Backstreet Boys and the Spice Girls, and "there wasn't going to be another Madonna, another Debbie Gibson, or another Tiffany.

[2] Senior vice president of A&R Jeff Fenster stated about Spears's audition that "It's very rare to hear someone that age who can deliver emotional content and commercial appeal.

"[3] They appointed her to work with producer Eric Foster White for a month, who reportedly shaped her voice from "lower and less poppy" delivery to "distinctively, unmistakably Britney.

[4] Spears had originally envisioned "Sheryl Crow music, but younger more adult contemporary" but felt all right with her label's appointment of producers, since "It made more sense to go pop, because I can dance to it—it's more me.

We were so busy.Fenster asked producer Max Martin to meet Spears in New York, after which he returned to Sweden to write her a handful of songs with long-term collaborator Denniz Pop.

When six songs were ready, Spears flew to Cheiron Studios in Stockholm, Sweden, where half of the album was recorded in May 1998,[7] nominally produced by Martin, Pop and Yacoub.

"[23] Marc Oxoby, author of The 1990s (2003), noted the song "was derided as vapid by some critics, yet tapped into the same kind of audience to whom the Spice Girls music appealed, young teens and pre-teens.

"[24] Amanda Murray of Sputnikmusic commented, "[" ... Baby One More Time" is] well-composed, tightly arranged, and even with Spears' vocal limitations it goes straight for the proverbial pop jugular.

"[27] Larry Flick of Billboard wrote, "Produced by famed Euro-popsters Max Martin and Eric Foster, "Baby, One More Time" chugs with an insinuating faux-funk beat and super-shiny synths.

[31] NME considered "...Baby One More Time" "incredible",[17] commenting that "it's a symphony of teenage lust as fully realised as anything Brian Wilson ever wrote—a truly grand pop song that overwhelms any lingering undercurrent of Lolita paedo-creepiness through the sheer fanatical earnestness of its delivery.

[33] On November 21, 1998, "...Baby One More Time" debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 at number 17 and topped the chart two and a half months later for two consecutive weeks, replacing R&B singer Brandy's "Have You Ever?".

[48] "...Baby One More Time" spent two consecutive weeks at number-one on the French Singles Chart and was certified platinum by the Syndicat National de l'Édition Phonographique after selling over 500,000 units in the country.

[48][49] Additionally, the song topped the German Singles Chart for six consecutive weeks and sold over 750,000 copies, resulting in a three-times gold certification by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

[56] Additionally, "...Baby One More Time" is the fifth best-selling single by a female artist in the country, behind Cher's "Believe", Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You", Adele's "Someone like You" and Céline Dion's "My Heart Will Go On".

[67] Wesley Yang in his essay "Inside the Box" in n+1, compared the music video to Britny Fox's "Girlschool" because it featured "a classroom full of Catholic schoolgirls gyrating to the beat in defiance of a stern teacher.

[72] Neil Strauss, from The New York Times, noted that "all the backing music was on tape, and most of the vocals were recorded, with Ms. Spears just reinforcing selected words in choruses and singing an occasional snippet of a verse".

After singing a shortened version of the song, she then took a few moments to shuffle into a form-fitting red rhinestone outfit (with side cutouts) and emerged onto a stage to perform "...Baby One More Time."

"[13] The Guardian said this cover showed a new and more "dark" side of the band, commenting "slowed down to a mournful crawl, it was amazing how ominous the couplet "This loneliness is killing me / Hit me, baby, one more time" sounded".

In 2003, the song was covered by American pop punk band Bowling for Soup for the soundtrack of the film Freaky Friday and commented that their version was "really, really, dark and really rock, [..] not the kind of 'pop'-py stuff that we usually do.

[105][106][107] Darren Criss also of Glee performed a mash-up of "...Baby One More Time" with "Für Elise" on Sing Out, Raise Hope for the Trevor Project and the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation in December 2011.

In 2020, Italian symphonic death metal band Fleshgod Apocalypse paid homage to the song in their single "No", slightly interpolating the chorus lines and melody near the end of the track with altered lyrics.

It was performed by Brazilian actress Giovanna Grigio and Mexican actor Alejandro Puente and was included in the soundtrack of the series released on January 5, 2022, by Sony Music Mexico.

[citation needed] A rock cover of the song by Tenacious D is featured in the end credits of the 2024 animated film Kung Fu Panda 4, which stars Jack Black in the titular role of Po.

[128] In April 2005, the British TV network ITV aired a short series called Hit Me, Baby, One More Time hosted by Vernon Kay.

[130] In the 2012 poll created by The Official Chart Company and ITV to discover The Nation's Favourite Number 1 Single of all-time, "...Baby One More Time" was listed as the seventh favorite song by the United Kingdom.

[138] Scott Plagenhoef of Pitchfork noted: "songs like Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit", Dr. Dre's "Nuthin' But a 'G' Thang", and Britney Spears' " ... Baby One More Time" altered the landscape of pop culture so quickly in large part because they were delivered to all corners of the U.S. simultaneously by MTV.

"[139] PopMatters's writer Evan Sawdey commented that Spears's concept for the song's music video was the one responsible for her immediate success, saying that, as a result, the singer "scored a massive No.

1 single, inadvertently started the late '90s teen pop boom, and created a public persona for herself that was simultaneously kid-friendly and pure male fantasy.

Her videos got played on both MTV and the Disney Channel at the same time, showing just how well Spears (and her armies of PR handlers) managed to walk that fine line between family-friendly pop idol and unabashed sex object.