Wanting to match the film in terms of addressing important themes, Lamar decided to produce a full curated soundtrack album rather than just the few songs requested by Coogler.

Lamar's soundtrack was released as Black Panther: The Album by Interscope Records on February 9, 2018, to large sales, including the top position on the Billboard 200 chart.

"[4] This included composer Ludwig Göransson,[4] who began working with Coogler at the University of Southern California and scored his earlier films Fruitvale Station and Creed.

[5][6] Coogler had previously met with musician Kendrick Lamar and Anthony Tiffith of Top Dawg Entertainment to discuss each other's work and the potential for them to collaborate on a project.

[7] As with his previous collaborations with Coogler, Göransson began work on the Black Panther score as early as possible, much earlier than any other composer on a Marvel Studios film according to producer Nate Moore.

"[11] Göransson then returned to Los Angeles where he planned to combine the African music he had discovered with his usual orchestral and modern production techniques to create the final score.

[13][15] When T'Challa visits the spirit of his father in the valley of the dead, Göransson felt the dialogue was so emotional that the instrumentation should be changed to reflect that, and so opted to focus on strings rather than percussion.

[25] Sounwave praised Marvel for giving Top Dawg Entertainment creative control over the album and for Coogler's initial decision to combine the Black Panther character with Lamar's music.

[8] Lamar teased his involvement with the album in an easter egg in the music video for his single "Love" in late December, with a clapperboard reading "B.Panther soundtrack coming soon.

[32] Sounwave explained that he and Lamar had spent months listening to a playlist of South African music in preparation for producing the album because they wanted to "go inside their world to get an organic sound, sonically and emotionally."

Saudi said that in his art, he "chose to stand for and fully represent my ethnicity and my origin," and was proud to continue that for "a song from the track list of the first and most anticipated black superhero movie.

"[7] Sounwave noted that it was a challenge to balance all of the different styles of artists on the album, like the "kerosene beats" of SOB x RBE with "Afrofuturist rapper" Vince Staples, while remaining consistent with Lamar's previous work and also being accessible to all potential filmgoers.

[38] The album features artwork by Nikolas A. Draper-Ivey, an artist known online for his fan art based on Disney intellectual property such as Black Panther and Spider-Man.

[99] Matt Miller of Esquire said the album was a "stunning moment in film history ... an absolute milestone," feeling that the fact that "these topics can even be breached on a [Disney] platform like this seems like progress might be possible.

[112] Writing for Vice, Robert Christgau called the music "sneakily experimental pop-rap" and credited Lamar for "marking every [song] with a verse or chorus or hook defined by the least regal of the great rap flows, unassumingly slurred while making every word count.

"[2] Andy Kellman gave the soundtrack four stars out of five for AllMusic, calling it an "unprecedented convergence of the mainstream film industry with an uncompromising musician thriving commercially and artistically."

She felt the South African artists included made the soundtrack "a fully fledged celebration of pan-continental black talent," echoing the film's message of representation as opposed to "mere tokenism."

He wrote that the elements from the Black Panther mythology that were included in the soundtrack were "goofy," but that they aligned with the themes of Lamar's other work, and also praised the female artists featured, specifically naming SZA, Jorja Smith, and Yugen Blakrok.

[115] Jon Parelis at The New York Times stated that all of the symbolic weight attached to the film extended itself to the album as well, and felt that the product was almost as densely packed with ideas as any of Lamar's solo works.

Parelis praised Sounwave's efforts as producer on the album, but noted that a majority of the guest artists treated their songs like music for California rather than the African setting of the film.

He concluded that "there is room to wonder what the outcome would have been if Kendrick and the rest of TDE swapped out James Blake and a few American rappers for artists like Jamaica's Spice [or] Brazil's Karol Conká ...

"[119] Dustin Seibert was excited for the album's release, but in his review of it for The Grio he expressed disappointment, finding many of the songs to be mediocre and especially criticizing Lamar's supportive work which he felt detracted from some of the guest performances.

[120] Brian Josephs at Pitchfork praised Göransson's "spectacular" score, feeling the composer was not simply "ticking off the diasporic boxes" by rooting the African elements of his music in the emotions of the film.

"[122] Reviewing the score for AllMusic, Neil Z. Yeung gave it four out of five stars, calling it triumphant and highlighting the moments where the African elements were combined with traditional orchestra and modern hip-hop.

[123] Luke Martin of Fortitude Magazine said the score "blows other Marvel soundtracks out of the water," calling it rich in African sounds that add gravity to "every aspect of the story, rooted in an emotional context."

He added that the album "definitely needs some trimming," but overall compared the score to Mark Mothersbaugh's for Thor: Ragnarok in being "another fantastic diversion from the norm in the Marvel Cinematic Universe without sacrificing the genre's core necessities.

"[128] Anton Smit of Soundtrack World was surprised by the score, expecting to hear standard superhero music and instead finding something fresh that "really uses genuine African elements, not just sounds that come out of a computer."

Interscope Records executive Manny Smith felt that Black Panther: The Album stood out because of the strong direction from Coogler and Lamar, adding, "I think it'll spark people to make more culturally relevant music and be more aware.

[159][160] James Whitbrook of io9 praised the EP as improving Göransson's already "sublime" score, calling the remixes "all pretty great, chill takes" on the existing music.

"[159] Hoair-Tran Bui at /Film said the EP was unlikely to become as popular as the main score or soundtrack albums, but felt that it provided "the perfect capper for the summer, and an energizing vehicle for Black Panther to ride through Oscar season.