A doo-wop song that recalls earlier styles of popular music, it was inspired by Trainor's insecurities about body image and encourages listeners to embrace their natural beauty and confidence.

The song reached the top 10 in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, the United Kingdom, and Vietnam.

Its music video, which premiered on Candy Crush Saga in October 2022, features bright colors and cameos by social media influencers.

Meghan Trainor achieved commercial success with her debut major-label studio album, Title (2015),[1] which produced three top-10 singles on the US Billboard Hot 100.

[2] She struggled while creating her third album on a label, Treat Myself (2020), rewriting it four times in an attempt to respond to market shifts in the music industry after the preceding singles underperformed.

[3] After the song "Title" attained viral popularity on video-sharing service TikTok in 2021, Trainor announced her intention to pivot to its doo-wop sound on her fifth major-label studio album.

[11] "Made You Look" was serviced to hot adult contemporary radio stations in the United States, as the second single from Takin' It Back (2022), on October 31, 2022.

[13] On December 9, 2022, its a cappella version, featuring guest vocals from Olsen, Scott Hoying, and influencers Elyse Myers and Sri, was released alongside an accompanying music video.

[10] Along with layered harmonies, it prominently features the bass and brass instruments, which Riff's Piper Westrom thought are reminiscent of the sound of Title.

[26] "Made You Look" has a call and response hook; Peter Piatkowski of PopMatters described it as a "spiritual sequel" to "All About That Bass" due to their shared "pouty, surly delivery and the girl group arrangement".

[10][27] She namechecks high-end luxury fashion houses, including Gucci and Louis Vuitton, and insists she looks better donning just her hoodie and "hotter when [her] morning hair's a mess".

[31] Rolling Stone placed it at number 69 on their list of 2022's best songs, and Tomás Mier positively compared it to Trainor's previous work and praised the "unforgettable lyrics and catchy production".

[33] Writing for Renowned for Sound, Max Akass believed she displayed a "cheeky, flirty attitude" on it, which made for uncomplicated but efficacious pop music.

Trainor stated that she wanted to achieve a superior and more saturated version of the video for "All About That Bass" by employing vivid and ebullient colors in it.

Cameos include TikTok influencers Hoying, JoJo Siwa, Drew Afualo, and Olsen as dancers, and Sabara as the car driver.

[78] An online dance challenge choreographed by TikTok users Brookie and Jessie set to "Made You Look" became a trend on the platform, following which around two million user-generated videos also used the song.