An accompanying music video was directed by Wayne Isham, and depicts each NSYNC member as a doll inside a toy store attempting to be bought by a female customer.

Carlsson whistled the eventual melody of "It's Gonna Be Me", which caught Martin's attention and subsequently told him to include it in the track.

[1] On the weekend of July 17 to 18, 1999, the band recorded vocals for the song in Battery Studios during their break from performing on the NSYNC in Concert tour in New York.

[1] During recording, Martin consciously wanted the lyrics to be sung in a specific way, which was described by NSYNC member JC Chasez in an interview with Billboard as saying "ET'S GONNA BAY MAY!"

[10] Carlsson compared the way Timberlake sung the note to the Backstreet Boys song "It's Gotta Be You" from their 1999 album Millennium, which the opening line "baby" was pronounced as "Bay-bay" instead of "Bay-bee".

[12][17] The lyrics of "It's Gonna Be Me" describes the scenario of a man attempting to persuade a woman to start a new relationship together so that she could recover from a previous breakup.

[8] Anna Rahmanan of Consequence of Sound opined that "It's Gonna Be Me" was catchy, but contained "meaningless yet understandable lyrics" in a formulaic song.

They noted how "the lyric juxtaposes the hesitancy of the song's love interest with the determination of an eager-to-please beau represented by both JC Chasez and Justin Timberlake".

[22] In a retrospective side-by-side comparison between the then 15th anniversary boy band albums No Strings Attached and Black & Blue, Ariana Bacle of Entertainment Weekly ranked "It's Gonna Be Me" as the second best song behind "The Call" (2000).

She stated that it was the "NSYNC discography's real star", claiming that the "relatively simple melody and Justin’s slightly menacing vocals" resulted in "an irresistible three minutes that climaxes with a bridge highlighting the kind of overlapping harmonies that define boy bands".

[26] The song was eventually sent to retail stores in the US on July 11, 2000, after it debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 at number 42 the previous week due to early street-date violations.

[30][31] "It's Gonna Be Me" was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on August 11, 2000, for selling 500,000 copies in the US in just a month of its retail release.

[38] On the Swedish Sverigetopplistan chart, the song peaked at number six on August 31, 2000, and remained for 10 weeks before receiving a gold certification for sales of 15,000 equivalent units.

It peaked at number 11 and charted for 12 weeks, before receiving a platinum certification by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) for shipping over 70,000 equivalent units.

[51] Initially, Isham pitched the idea for San Francisco-based effects house company Radium to create the dolls by using CGI.

Consequently, both the song and dancing members needed to perform at half speed due to mathematical problems, which was also attributed to the set scaled 7.2 times larger than the real world.

Joey Fatone accidentally knocks down a stack of dominoes forming the band's logo, before the NSYNC dolls frantically run atop the shelf when they notice the same woman walking past their section earlier.

While transitioning throughout the music video, the real-life NSYNC members perform a choreographed dance routine in a domed arena, which contains multi-colored strobe lighting effects constantly alternating the background colors.

The music video for "It's Gonna Be Me" reached the top position on Total Request Live several times from May to September 2000, which also included the "End of Summer" special and the countdown for the 500th episode.

[66] NSYNC appeared on several television programs to perform "It's Gonna Be Me", such as Good Morning America,[67] The Rosie O'Donnell Show,[68] and Top of the Pops.

[70] During the Super Bowl XXXV halftime show on January 28, 2001, NSYNC performed "It's Gonna Be Me" as part of a back-and-forth medley with Aerosmith.

The members wore outfits containing pyrotechnics sparking out from their hands,[71] as Aerosmith lead singer Steven Tyler screamed the last line of the chorus.

[74] The song was also included on PopOdyssey, where each band member rode go-karts, shot Nerf guns, and played with several over-sized toys.

It contained cameos from NSYNC members Chris Kirkpatrick as an assembly line worker and Fatone as a toy store employee.

[86] American television series Supergirl played "It's Gonna Be Me" in the tenth episode of its fifth season, where critics questioned the song's appropriateness in its accompanying "bar fight" scene.

[87][88][89] American rock band All Time Low interpolated the chorus of "It's Gonna Be Me" in the song "Clumsy", which is included in their eighth studio album Wake Up, Sunshine (2020).

Lead vocalist Alex Gaskarth acknowledged that he accidentally added the "oscillating melody" into the pre-chorus, although he intended to include a pop reference.