He also notes that the production was purposely minimal to capture the purity of the tune as a folk song.

A Muzak version of "She's Always a Woman" can be heard playing in the background of a video recorded by a WNYW news crew with camera operator Jack Taliercio in the Austin J. Tobin Plaza of the World Trade Center complex in New York City on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, after two commercial airliners hijacked by Al-Qaeda terrorists were deliberately flown into each of the Twin Towers as part of a large-scale terrorist attack.

The soundtrack dissonance of the song playing amidst falling debris and the noise of the blaze in the environment of the two burning skyscrapers was viewed as "surreal".

"[6] Billboard particularly praised the "subtle orchestration" and "sophisticated melody," which it found comparable to ballads by Bob Dylan and Paul Simon.

[6] Cash Box said that "the tune is melodic and flows sweetly; the lyric is precise and has something to say" and praised Joel's singing.

Fyfe Dangerfield, lead singer of the band Guillemots, recorded a version of this song in 2010 which was used in an advertisement for the British department store John Lewis.

In the annual ITV poll for 2010 advert of the year; "John Lewis – She's always a Woman" ranked fourth.

The advert has been viewed on YouTube over 570,000 times (collectively from the top 3 results) since it aired on TV.