[4] Charles Spurgeon called this psalm "the song of the Astronomer", as gazing at the heavens (verse 3 in KJV) inspires the psalmist to meditate on God's creation and man's place in it.

Spurgeon further interpreted the "babes and sucklings" to whom the Lord gives strength (verse 2 in KJV) as referring variously to man, David, Jesus, the apostles, and all "who fight under Christ's banner".

[4] According to the Midrash Tehillim, verses 5 through 10 in the Hebrew contain questions that the angels asked God as God was creating the world, referring to the righteous men of Israel: Psalm 8 manifests a prevailing theme of man in creation, serving as a precursor to a sequential arrangement of acrostic Psalms 9 and 10.

[13] In the Roman Rite the psalm is recited twice a month as part of the Liturgy of the Hours, at Lauds on Saturday of weeks two and four.

[17] Psalm 8 inspired hymn lyrics such as Folliott Sandford Pierpoint's "For the Beauty of the Earth" which first appeared in 1864 and "How Great Thou Art", based on a Swedish poem written by Carl Boberg in 1885.

Heinrich Schütz wrote a setting of a paraphrase in German, "Mit Dank wir sollen loben", SWV 104, for the Becker Psalter, published first in 1628.Michel Richard Delalande, composer of King Louis XIV, wrote an extended Latin motet setting this psalm, which was performed at the Royal Chapel of Versailles for royal offices.

Peter Moore contends that Shakespeare was inspired by a paraphrase of Psalm 8 composed by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, as he awaited execution in the Tower of London in late 1546 or early 1547.

[20] During his return to Earth from the first human landing on the Moon, astronaut Buzz Aldrin recited verses 4-5.