[2] Patrick Hyland produced the album, which has been characterized as a record blending synth-pop, indie pop and electronic rock styles.

[6] Mitski also described the album as a "soundtrack for transformation, a map to the place where vulnerability and resilience, sorrow and delight, error and transcendence can all sit within our humanity, can all be seen as worthy of acknowledgment, and ultimately, love".

[16] On "Stay Soft", Mitski sings about "providing love to someone who isn't willing to give it back, retreating into a shell caused by past wounds".

[20] Paolo Ragusa at Consequence gave Laurel Hell a perfect score, describing it as the sound of "Mitski trusting herself, confidently blazing forward into the next decade of her storied career.

"[28] Commenting on the hiatus Mitski took from music in the aftermath of her previous full-length Be the Cowboy, DIY's Ben Tipple said "That Laurel Hell exists only because it almost didn't gives it its power.

"[23] In less favorable reviews, Steven Hyden of Uproxx described the LP as a "disappointment", saying that "Laurel Hell meanwhile is a tentative, frustrating record of half-measures trapped between musical worlds to which Mitski refuses to commit.

While David Smyth of the Evening Standard hailed it at as an "air-punching blast of Eighties-influenced synthpop" with hit potential,[30] Pitchfork's Cat Zhang cited its production as having the "effect of anonymizing her, subsuming a first-class songwriter into a tired palette.