The first four levels of Super Mario Run are free to play, but unlocking the rest of the game requires a one-time payment.

Reviewers generally praised the game's replay value and addictive gameplay, though common criticism was directed towards its comparatively high price in the mobile market, as well as its required connectivity to the internet.

The player's end goal is to not only steer Mario safely across the level and reach the flagpole before time is exhausted but also accumulate as many coins as possible.

[15] The player can unlock other characters to play as through these game modes, such as Luigi, Princess Peach, Toad, Toadette, and Yoshi.

[21] A later update added nine new levels, courses, Princess Daisy as a playable character, and buildings, all of which can be unlocked by completing various goals and challenges.

[16][35] Similarly, they observed speedrunners were adept at performing certain types of difficult timed jumps that enabled quick completion times; Nintendo included special blocks that players would encounter in Super Mario Run to easily complete similar jumps, so that they could "give even beginner players an opportunity to get a taste for what's fun about the more skilled style of Mario play", according to Miyamoto.

[13] Part of the reason for this pricing scheme was to make it transparent to parents who may be purchasing the game for their children so that they would not incur further costs.

[43] Fearing piracy of the game, Nintendo added always-on DRM, which requires that players have a persistent Internet connection to play.

[44] Polygon speculated that Nintendo opted to develop the game first for the iOS platform because of its stronger security options and consistent ecosystem compared to Android.

[18][45] Since its inception, Super Mario Run has seen updates that mostly expanded support for Nintendo accounts or added or changed gameplay content.

[21] A significant update in September that year added Daisy as a new character, World Star[22] and the Remix 10 game mode.

[23] Upon release, Super Mario Run received "generally positive reviews" from critics, holding an aggregated Metacritic score of 76/100.

[65] The game's Toad Rally mode was a point of division for players, as while some praised the mode, others expressed concern that its competitive features would prevent players without high amount of skill from being able to advance development of their Mushroom Kingdom, as well as the Rally Ticket entry system being seemingly unnecessary for a game without microtransactions.

[15] Industry analyst Michael Pachter suggested that the low user ratings reflect the non-traditional single-point-of-purchase approach for monetization, and that mobile gamers are more amenable towards free-to-play games that provide a larger amount of free content prior before any microtransactions are required to proceed forward.

[67] Polygon considered that based on the negative feedback from players, that Nintendo kept too many of its own practices for its consoles and handhelds, such as the use of the Friend Code system and the lack of any planned expansions, into Super Mario Run, as well as eschewing typical mobile gaming practices, and believed that Nintendo should have worked better to adapt the game for the expectations of mobile gamers.

[70] Shortly after the game's announcement, Nintendo's stock soared to just under the high point it had reached after the release and success of Pokémon Go earlier in 2016.

On the Monday following the game's release on iOS, Nintendo's and DeNA's stock price dropped over seven percent due to its poor market reception.

[85][86] Wall Street Journal's Dan Gallagher stated this conversion rate represented the difficulty in convincing mobile gamers to purchase content.

[90] However, Nintendo's president Tatsumi Kimishima was disappointed the next month, when the revenue from the iOS version failed to fulfill the company's expectations.

[92] Kimishima said that Nintendo had learned several lessons in development and releasing of mobile games from Super Mario Run.

[82] Kimishima said that "we honestly prefer the Super Mario Run model",[91] though in a June 2017 investor question-and-answer session, he said "in the future we will consider not only a single set price, but other methods that incorporate a wider variety of elements that allow as many consumers as possible to play", suggesting that Nintendo's mobile strategy may move away from the pay-once model.

[93] Within days of the game's App Store release, journalists noted a number of unofficial video game clones that appeared on the Google Play store, which they believe was prompted by the lack of an Android version of Super Mario Run at the time and allowing developers to take advantage of uninformed consumers.