[12] In Prism received a Metacritic score of 79 based on 14 reviews, indicating a generally favorable critical reception.

Jason Lymangrover of AllMusic writes: "Polvo's first studio album since 1997's Shapes, 2009's In Prism is a solid return to mathy form.

Although 12 years is a long hiatus, it's hardly noticeable that time has passed, with the exception of a few machinery and personnel updates [...] Along with getting mathy and ultra-precise, the band takes the opposite approach and elongates passages, stretching songs into psychedelic space rock territory and surpassing the eight-minute mark on several occasions.

Despite a middling score, John Everheart of Under the Radar called it "a sprawling, psychedelic masterwork, rife with knotty tangles of discordance and serpentine riffs."

Stuart Berman of Pitchfork wrote: "In Prism could be the first Polvo album where the melodies leave as lasting an impression as the noise around them, with Bowie tapping into a more guileless mode of expression that rarely revealed itself before."