[11] The album's cover art and typography was designed by artist Ed Ruscha,[12] an acquaintance of the McCartney family.

The following week, McCartney's Twitter account started posting photos at 33 minutes past the hour with a recurring motif of three.

[15] On 21 October, McCartney's social media channels officially announced the forthcoming release of the album on 11 December.

[16] On 19 November, it was announced that due to unforeseeable production delays, the album release date had to be moved back one week to 18 December.

[19] During his appearance on The Howard Stern Show on 15 December 2020, McCartney revealed that American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift originally decided to postpone the release of her album Evermore by one week to respect the original 11 December release date of his album.

Upon learning this, McCartney decided to release his album on 18 December instead so that Swift could move forward with the rollout of Evermore as initially planned.

[24] In November 2021, an additional edition of Third Man Records exclusive vinyl was released: yellow with black splatter, it was limited to 3,333 copies.

[34] The placement earned McCartney the feat of being the first artist to have a new album at the top or second-top of the chart in each of the last six decades.

[35] The album also recorded the third largest US vinyl sales week since Nielsen SoundScan tracking era began in 1991.

[42] Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone wrote that McCartney III "recalls the pastoral, laid-back sound of his 1970 solo debut" and describes the album as a "playful gem".

In his album review for NME, Mark Beaumont calls the LP a "stellar return to his three-decade-spanning series".

Described as an album of "reinterpretations, remixes, and covers" of songs from McCartney III, it became available on streaming services on 16 April and was released on physical media by 23 July.