[2][3] The recording features elaborate four-part harmonies (particularly in the choruses, and also providing backing parts in the verses), and also a multitracked guitar solo by Brian May which makes use of the bell effect.

[16][17] It was released as a double A-side in the UK, the US, and Canada (where it reached number 15 in the RPM 100 national singles chart),[18] with the song "Flick of the Wrist".

[19] Freddie Mercury:[20] People are used to hard rock, energy music from Queen, yet with this single you almost expect Noël Coward to sing it.

It was the song that best summed up our kind of music, and a big hit, and we desperately needed it as a mark of something successful happening for us...

The first time I heard Freddie playing that song, I was lying in my room in Rockfield [a residential recording studio in Wales], feeling very sick.

So I remember just lying there, hearing Freddie play this really great song and feeling sad, because I thought, 'I can't even get out of bed to participate in this.'

[25] On the single's release, Cash Box said that it had "fine lead vocals, solid harmonies and an inventive production" and that "this song is bound to make you smile with its lighthearted whimsy and confident approach.

[28] American pop singer Katy Perry cites "Killer Queen" as an important influence on her, saying it "made me discover music and helped me come into my own at the age of 15".

[62][63][64] According to 5 Seconds of Summer, Queen's "unique harmonies, the fluidity to their songwriting and how they each used their own musicality to back each other up have always inspired us.

For us, the exploration of individual vocalists in a band is incredibly important and Queen helped us to see the future of how we want to sing, in addition to how we play our instruments.

While somewhat modernised, the single fades out in a style similar to the original Queen banger, and other '70s hits of the time".