[1] Post Malone premiered the song live during his Bud Light Dive Bar Tour show in New York City on August 5, where he claimed it would be released the following week.

Billboard described it as being "backed by sunny acoustic guitars, swirling percussion, and infectious melodies",[8] and that while it has a "funky feel, the meaning is a bit more somber, detailing a relationship gone cold".

[11] On the chart dated November 30, 2019, "Circles" became Post Malone's fourth number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 and his first unaccompanied by another artist.

Malone filed a lawsuit against songwriter Tyler Armes for "falsely claiming that he is a co-author of the musical composition contained in the 'Circles' track".

Post Malone plays a knight in armor who has to rescue a princess locked up in a tower (but endowed with magical powers).

The princess, seeing the future through a magic mirror, discovers that Post will be defeated by the enemies and burned alive.

Meanwhile, Post has a hallucination in which he sees the same future and is then buried alive by zombies, but the princess awakens him with a magic blue rose (which symbolizes the unattainable).

But the director's choice to show again, at the end of the video, Post staring at that tragic future during the hallucination, suggests that it is bound to happen.

Sheryl Crow covered the song in 2022, with it getting airplay on Pat Monahan's Train Tracks program on SiriusXM's The Pulse.