McCartney wrote the song about English actress Jane Asher, his girlfriend for much of the 1960s,[3] and her refusal to give up her stage career and focus on his needs.

The outro switches over to single-tracking, which Alan W. Pollack opines creates a "surprising last minute sense of increased intimacy and immediacy".

[8] Take 1 also featured an electric twelve-bar blues jam, and a pitch centre in the key of G.[6] The Beatles recorded the first remake of the track on 6 November, towards the end of the Rubber Soul sessions, but were again dissatisfied with the result.

[6][11] The same melodic structure was later used by McCartney in the verse of "Penny Lane", the chorus of "Maxwell's Silver Hammer", and in instrumental sections of "Hello, Goodbye" and "Lady Madonna".

[6] The final released version features several faintly audible abnormalities such as incomplete hand clapping, stray guitar notes and tambourine hits; whether these mistakes went unnoticed during post-production or were intentionally left in remains uncertain.

[10] In his contemporary review of Rubber Soul for the NME, Allen Evans said that "I'm Looking Through You" sounded "like earlier Beatles numbers", adding: "A quiet, rocking song about a girl who has changed after letting her boy down.