Dido co-produced the album, helped by producers including Jeff Bhasker, Jon Brion, Greg Kurstin, Rick Nowels, Plain Pat, Rollo.

Girl Who Got Away received generally positive reviews from music critics, who complimented "folky midtempo melody" and Dido's vocal performances, while others stated that the album didn't "break any new ground".

[5] In September 2010, Dido unveiled her brand new single, "Everything to Lose", and the track was released via digital download,[6] having previously appeared on the Sex and the City 2 soundtrack.

[9] On the title track, synthesizer chords puff gentle syncopations as Dido wishes she could be "the girl who got away",[10] shifting and twirling in a slow dance through electronic caresses and the subtlest touches of strings.

[12] Dido finds guests to keep her current, like Kendrick Lamar, whose rap tears through the conciliatory "Let Us Move On",[10] a spooked trip hop song.

[10] "Sitting on the Roof of the World" carried by folky guitar picking, reflects on sudden pop success and "not knowing how I got there or how to leave," insisting that she'd rather just "fit in" to everyday life.

[10] It offers a sobering moment of reflection, and a host of possible allusions to Dido's experiences within the music industry: "Everyone says I was lucky to have got there/ as not many can/ I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss it now and then.

"[11] "Love to Blame" features "finger-clicking brass"[13] and it includes the line "there's time enough for new things yet," over "pleasingly wobbly low end", a smart instrumental section and all manner of odd bleeping effects.

[8] "Go Dreaming", which vows to rise above bullying,[10] moves with a rubbery bassline pushing the track forward as it falls deeper into a well of electronica.,[11] while "Happy New Year" features descending bass line and trip hop backbeat, with the singer missing an ex who may be absent or dead,[10] and "Loveless Heart" is epitomised by a vast, sweeping scope, and talks about creeping up and under the defences we’ve put around our feelings, all in an effort to cope in a hectic, modern world.

[11] And in "Day Before We Went to War," with keyboards from Brian Eno, Dido sets personal moping aside to come up with a genuine enigma: an eerily pretty vision of mass destruction.

[30] Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic gave the album 4 (out of 5 stars), writing that, "while her last album, Safe Trip Home, was tailored for domesticity, Girl Who Got Away is a soundtrack for a night out,"[31] praising Dido for "adapting to her gently shifting surroundings, feeling perfectly at home in this neon-streaked production, savouring how it swings from understated but insistent beats to a soft acoustic bed.

"[11] Nick Levine of BBC Music gave a favourable review, writing that, "Admittedly, the album contains the odd soporific song like No Freedom, but these turns are outweighed by tracks with a strong tune or an unexpected hint of sadness.

"[8] For Andy Gill of The Independent, "it ticks along unremarkably on smudges of synthesiser and shuffling drum programmes, augmented by acoustic guitar or synthetic brass stabs.