[6] "Dancing on My Own" became Robyn's first number one in her native country following its live premiere on Swedish TV show Sommarkrysset and also reached the top ten in Denmark, Norway and the United Kingdom later that month.

Frequent collaborator Max Vitali directed "Dancing on My Own"'s Rosie Perez-inspired music video, first released on 21 May 2010, that showed Robyn portraying the protagonist in the song's lyrics in various club and rehearsal settings.

Deep into sessions one "dark" week of November 2009 in Stockholm with longtime collaborator Klas Åhlund,[7][8] Robyn's "stormy"[9] engagement to Swedish MMA fighter and contemporary visual artist Olof Inger was starting to fray.

"[15] Conceptualizing club culture, Robyn created narratives for past patrons she had seen from situations she had witnessed, including their "expectations" for the night to "meet that person", reach a "good high", or experience "some kind of emotion", revisiting stories from Olof on his time as a doorman describing how they'd act then reminiscing on her time in New York City in 1997 promoting Robyn Is Here as a "lonely misfit teenager shoulder-shimmying alone in a gloomy corner" on Club Vinyl's "last ever" Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, The Shelter, and the "near mythological" Body&SOUL, respectively.

[23] "With an idea of a chorus in her mind," Robyn wanted to work further with Åhlund but couldn't stop "toying" with the song on her own, eventually reaching out to prior collaborator Patrik Berger for a "different perspective".

Recalling her excitement upon initially "sending the demo to the record label and telling them I thought we had a good single", its themes of "nostalgia and sentimentality" in retrospect came across like a "teenage version" of herself she was "happy to let go of".

[27] The song's second synth-pop[2] version, designed for radio and first heard accompanying its music video when it premiered on 21 May 2010, was released as a bonus track to Body Talk Pt.

"[39] Vanyaland's Michael Marotta pointed out a small bell effect resembling last call that rings at the climax of the song in both electronic versions' middle 8, interpreting its inclusion as an indication the protagonist's time had run out in her last effort to gain notice from the ex-lover.

[40] Robyn's "love letter" to Stockholm as indicated in her "favorite lyric" describing its weather in winter, a "big black sky over [her] town",[5] the song's "bittersweet, voyeuristic narrative" is of "a woman dancing alone in a crowded club while her ex and his new lover look on",[41] with a deliberate "bait and switch"[27] of production that sounds in its opening "life-affirming" but in reality is backing what the listener soon realizes is a "bleak, wounded"[41] "breakup song" lyrically, a deliberate "juxtaposition"[27] "of light and dark at the same time" whose "magic" Robyn explained to Kindness at Red Bull Music Academy is what she's "drawn to when [she] make[s] music", and is "much more satisfying" to her than just one feeling or the other, which she'd found "predictable" and "boring".

"[49] Leslie Simon of MTV Buzzworthy named it a "Video You Need To Know" and wrote, "Amid a sea of strobe lights and PDA-stricken couples, Robyn seems cautiously fed up with dancing solo.

"[50] Jake Hall of Dazed saw the video's "stand-out moment" as accompanying the song's "hammering drums transition into the final chorus", when Robyn is shown "ruthlessly throwing punches as strobe lights frame her wounded aggression.

'[52] Fraser McAlpine of BBC Radio 1 was stunned at the about-face from the "fragile waif" displayed in that prior song, praising Robyn's "always [...] ready-packed" voice "with a whole world of pain and anguish", the song's "punishingly tough" production and new narrative, and her "toughness" which "lies in her ability to express total agony, and total assurance at the same time, via the medium of a plaintive chorus [...] "[46] Nick Levine of Digital Spy lauded the "misty-eyed electro-disco tune" he similarly found "every bit as emotive" as her singles from Robyn, including "'Be Mine!'

[...] If your bottom lip's not quivering like the bassline by the time the second chorus hits, you've taken waaay too many mood stabilisers [...] "[53] Pitchfork's Ryan Dombal appreciated it showed "the scuffs on her scepter" in comparison to her promotional singles from Body Talk Pt.

"[56] Jer Fairall wrote for PopMatters that "[t]he aggressive stun-gun rhythm of 'Dancing On My Own' can't hide a classic drama-played-out-on-the-dancefloor scenario inherited from standard bearers like ABBA's 'Dancing Queen' and Madonna's 'Into the Groove', nor is it cold enough not to melt at the touch of Robyn's warm, yearning vocals or the song's shimmering keyboard chime.

"[59] Rolling Stone named it the twenty-sixth best song of 2010, writing: "The Swedish diva spots her beloved with another girl – then turns her sadness into sparkling pop, perfect for solo freakouts.

[92] Time,[93] NPR listeners,[94] Paste,[95] Good Housekeeping,[96] The Interns[97] and The Wild Honey Pie[98] ranked it second, Pitchfork third,[99] Elle[100] and Treble[101] fourth and USA Today ninth.

[6] Released at what Harper's Bazaar's Natalie Maher deemed "the height of the pop renaissance" of the late 2000s/early 2010s, several columnists thought it took a decade for the song's influence to be appreciated critically due to the sharp contrast with its initial commercial reception, a result of several factors including its tone and theme.

"Seamlessly ushering dance music to the forefront of the pop continuum by making a record and a single that was easily adaptable to radio play but didn't alienate its raw emotions, delivering a certain edge and undeniable melancholia", it arrived "just when brainless EDM started taking off in the US", and as Treble's Jeff Terich observed, "the protagonist of every other pop hit from the early half of the decade [turned] a possible sexual encounter with a nightclub fling into the 'Most Important Moment on Earth,'" (and Robyn reminded us that "no, it doesn't always work out that way").

[101] "Never touching the Hot 100" as Pitchfork's Ryan Dombal noted[108] Fawbert saw it taking "another nine-and-a-half years" to reveal its impact over the course of the decade after "slowly unleashing its tentacles and hooking itself around the music world."

"[5] In October 2020 The Guardian's Alexis Petridis detailed the track's "brilliant electronic rebooting of the old disco trick whereby euphoric club music is paired with lyrical despair" and Pitchfork's Jamieson Cox saw a similar dynamic when comparing her output to fellow Swedes ABBA for a September 2019 retrospective of their iconic greatest hits compilation released in 1992, expressing that she "became one of this decade's great pop heroes by pinning down that same sad-ecstatic balance and welding it to modern, muscular production.

"[111] To that end, Lorde shared with Vice her "friendly fixation" with Robyn, including keeping a framed portrait of her on the piano during her performance of "Liability" on Saturday Night Live and in the studio as a "patron saint" to watch over the Melodrama sessions.

[151] Tracking the data behind the sudden rise in engagement and speed of new subscribers to Calum's channel over several months, A&R executive Conrad Withey encouraged him to release the song officially.

With this early exposure, Conrad's Instrumental, a London-based AI algorithm-based A&R start-up looking to streamline "notoriously inefficient methods of talent discovery" using internet engagement to cut costs with a "data-driven" platform that would controversially prioritize "popular[ity]" over "artistry" in support of "online engagement", "internet stars" and "brand and content partnerships" rather than "musicians", reversing preconceived notions of building fanbases from scratch by capitalizing on those that already existed, went on to contract their services with the 'Big 3' and revolutionize A&R signing of artists.

[152][153] Scott's cover was noted for its "soft focus",[154] with critical reception being polarized, and streaming performance being very strong in the UK and Australia, followed by sleeper hit longevity throughout Europe.

Metro Weekly's Sean Maunier called it a "stellar" confessional, noting its "subtle yet powerful" slight lyric changes to "reflect his own experience as a gay man" that were "casual" yet still "matter-of-fact, and all the more striking for it,"[157] Ones to Watch's Miro Sarkissian praised it as "stunning",[158] and Digital Journal's Markos Papadatos found it "crisp and haunting".

USA Today's Bryan Kalbrosky dismissed it outright as "inferior", arguing there was simply "no reason to listen" to it "so long as Robyn’s [original] exists"[162] while We Rave You's Petar Lazarevic appreciated Tiësto "slowly envelope[d]" yet still left "plenty of room" for Calum's vocals, building "the presence of the glossy guitar riffs in the drop" which evoked "the lazy and comfortable feelings that accompany the early hours of the morning after a fantastic night".

[173] The cover aired on the 20th episode, "Kill 'em All" of The CW series The Vampire Diaries, broadcast 29 April 2016, while Caroline makes soup for Bonnie while ranting to Alaric about Stefan, commitment and closure.

Belgian singer Kato Callebaut performed Robyn's downtempo version as part of her audition on Idool 2011 then released her studio cover, receiving a gold certification for 10,000+ copies sold.

[235] American rock band Kings of Leon performed but never officially released a cover of Robyn's ballad during a session on Zane Lowe's show on BBC Radio 1, officially posted by the show to their YouTube channel on 10 September 2013, which Billboard's Jason Lipshutz went on to describe as an "injection" of its "muscular Southern rock stylings" with "meaty guitar riffs", "Caleb Followill's signature growl in full effect", and with the "'Whoa-oh-oh's' echo on the chorus", a recalling of the singer's "epic "Use Somebody" flare-ups".

[236] Instinct's Jeremy Hinks slammed it as "nails on a chalkboard,"[237] while Spin's Marc Hogan praised it as "disarmingly effective" and having brought out Robyn's "smart songwriting", noting their connection to her "deeply conflicted relationship with mainstream success".