[3] After experiencing "the biggest breakup of her life", Li moved from Sweden to Los Angeles, where she spent two and a half years writing I Never Learn.

[5] During much of her time in California, Li listened to Van Morrison's 1968 album Astral Weeks, Harry Nilsson demos, The Band and Dennis Wilson.

[8] She described I Never Learn as a collection of "power ballads for the broken",[9] adding that the album is "about me and the guilt and the shame and the hurt and the pride and the confusion of being a woman.

[14] To promote the album, Li embarked on an 11-date tour across Europe and the US, which began in Stockholm on 24 April 2014 and ended in Los Angeles on 19 May.

"[37] John Murphy of musicOMH praised the songwriting as "wonderful" and characterised the production as "a typically Scandinavian brand of delicious melancholy with an added injection of wistful hopefulness", while dubbing the album "a heart-wrenching, utterly compelling listen".

[40] Timothy Monger of AllMusic noted that Li "manages a tunefulness that aspires to great pop heights, yet retains the wintry austerity of her Nordic roots.

"[7] Simon Harper of Clash described the album as "tender and compelling" and wrote, "Though her personal tragedy has been transformed into an affecting record of real beauty, one truly hopes Li's next chapter isn't quite so agonising.

[34] Rolling Stone's Sophie Weiner opined that the album's "[Phil] Spector-ish arrangements, thick with multitracked vocals and densely layered instruments, don't always add as much as they should: The simplest songs here are the most affecting", while commenting, "If Lykke Li keeps refining her voice, she'll soon rank as an A-list pop heart-crusher.

"[38] Slant Magazine's Kevin Liedel stated, "Though she's largely eschewing Youth Novels's bubbly synth-pop and Wounded Rhymes's slick power ballads for simpler arrangements and derelict instrumentation, Li still manages to make the ramshackle music of I Never Learn sound grand and, perhaps more impressively, inject a kind of dark romanticism into her depictions of crippling separation.

"[42] Arnold Pan of PopMatters viewed it as "a more mature album in theme and sound when compared to the playfulness and whimsy that made Youth Novels and ...

Pan also wrote, "Despite the finality of what's supposed to be the third installment of a three-part series, I Never Learn promises more in the future as Lykke Li keeps moving along her own singular path, personally and artistically.

[36] Despite calling the title track "a gorgeous opener", The Independent's Andy Gill found that the album "needs greater variety, some sort of joy against which to measure the pain.