For the mixtape, Chance also collaborated with musicians such as Kanye West, Young Thug, Francis and the Lights, Justin Bieber, 2 Chainz, Kirk Franklin, and the Chicago Children's Choir.

It was the first mixtape to chart on the US Billboard 200 solely on streams, peaking at number eight, while receiving widespread acclaim from critics who praised its fusion of hip hop and gospel sounds.

[2] Chance the Rapper told Complex that Coloring Book would be a superior record to Surf, the 2015 album that he had released with his group Donnie Trumpet & The Social Experiment.

[3] As with his other mixtapes, 10 Day and Acid Rap, the cover artwork was painted by Chicago-based artist Brandon Breaux, who depicted Chance holding his baby daughter (below the frame) in order to capture the expression on his face.

[4] According to Financial Times music critic Ludovic Hunter-Tilney, Coloring Book is an upbeat gospel rap album whose themes of spiritual fulfillment and worldly accomplishment are explored in music "that places gospel choirs and jazzy horns in a modern setting of Auto-Tuned hooks and crisp beats".

[5] Rolling Stone's Christopher R. Weingarten wrote that the gospel choirs were the foundation of the mixtape's music, functioning in the same way disco interpolations had on the earliest rap records, James Brown rhythms had for Public Enemy, and soul samples had for Kanye West.

[16] Reviewing for the Chicago Tribune in May 2016, Greg Kot hailed the album as "a celebration of singing, harmonizing, human voices making a joyous noise together",[20] while Kris Ex from Pitchfork named it "one of the strongest rap albums released this year, an uplifting mix of spiritual and grounded that even an atheist can catch the Spirit to".

[24] Writing for Vice, Robert Christgau believed Chance's already irrepressibly cheerful voice sounded more attractive and substantial than before because of how the music's gospel elements had encouraged a stronger "vocal muscle" and controlled pitch.

[26] Jon Caramanica of The New York Times argued that Chance had drawn on the spirituality and consciousness present in West's music while "blossoming into a crusader and a pop savant, coming as close as anyone has to eradicating the walls between the sacred and the secular".

He found his flow melodically and rhythmically dense yet deft and effortless, while deeming his narratives both intimate and universal, touching on familial duties, the violent crime in Chance's native Chicago, and being an independent artist in the modern music industry era.

[29] Christgau ranked it as the ninth best album of the year in his ballot for The Village Voice's annual Pazz & Jop critics poll.