It was released on February 8, 2019, by Republic Records, six months after her fourth studio album Sweetener (2018), which was conceived in the midst of Grande's personal struggles, including the death of ex-boyfriend Mac Miller and the end of her engagement to Pete Davidson.

Grande began working on the album in October 2018, enlisting writers and producers such as Tommy Brown, Max Martin, Ilya Salmanzadeh and Pop Wansel.

The album was preceded by two singles: the title track and "7 Rings", both of which debuted atop the Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming Grande's first two number-one songs in the United States.

All of the album's 12 tracks entered the Hot 100, with the singles occupying the top three spots, making Grande the first soloist to achieve this feat.

It was certified double platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America, and landed at number two on the US Billboard 200 Year-End chart of 2019.

In August 2018, singer Ariana Grande's Sweetener was released to critical acclaim, her best received album to that point.

Republic Records sought to bolster Sweetener's global rollout by releasing "Breathin" as the third single, but the label abruptly postponed their promotional endeavors when Grande's old friend and ex-boyfriend, rapper Mac Miller, died from an accidental drug overdose in early September.

[10] Songwriters included her longtime collaborators Victoria Monet, Max Martin, Ilya Salmanzadeh, and Tommy Brown in addition to Tayla Parx, Charles Anderson, Social House's Michael Foster, and others.

[13] Grande's team kept champagne in the studio, notably Veuve Clicquot, as later referenced in her collaboration with songwriter Victoria Monét, "Monopoly".

[15] Grande found creating "Ghostin" difficult and initially requested the song's exclusion from the final track listing.

[22] Rob Sheffield from Rolling Stone stated that the album is about a woman taking her mood "out for a drive until she pedal-to-the-metals it right off a cliff.

[23] Lyrically, the song is about the attack on her concert in Manchester and the death of ex-boyfriend Mac Miller, and the emotional toll that these events inflicted upon her.

[41] "Bad Idea" is an EDM and trap number, beginning with an 80's rock-ballad intro that garnered comparison to David Guetta's 2012 hit single "Titanium" featuring Sia.

[44] The seventh track "Make Up" is Grande's most sexually explicit song on the album, featuring many double entendres.

[25][45] Lyrically, it discusses Grande's last two relationships, stating that "she should ghost the guy that still makes her cry and wants to stop hurting the person she is with now while he is being patient with her," being Miller and Davidson.

[39] Savan Kotecha, who co-wrote the song with Grande, told Rolling Stone of working on the track: "[When we were writing] 'Ghostin,' we were in New York...

[48][49][50] It features a heavy bass[51] and sees Grande discuss "how global success has allowed her to enjoy the finer things".

On releasing the album so soon after her previous offering, Grande said she dreamed of putting out music like a rapper does and break "certain standards that pop women are held to that men aren't."

Tired of previous release strategies used for her records, she explained: "'Bruh, I just want to fucking talk to my fans and sing and write music and drop it the way these boys do.

This also made Grande the third artist in history to have an album with two songs that debuted at number one on the Hot 100, after Drake's Scorpion in 2018 and Mariah Carey's Daydream in 1995.

[83] As the track became her fifth number-one single in Ireland, Grande now also holds the record for the most number ones in the 2010s decade on the chart, alongside Rihanna.

[84] "Break Up with Your Girlfriend, I'm Bored" debuted at number two on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming Grande's 13th top ten single on the chart.

"[17] Mikael Wood of the Los Angeles Times said, "Thank U, Next flaunts Grande's emotional healing; it's suffused with the joy of discovering that what didn't kill her really did make her stronger.

"[100] Michael Cragg of The Guardian commented that Thank U, Next seems to be a "result of a burst of creativity and a prevailing mood", yet criticized "7 Rings" as a "braggadocious, ice-cold low point" of the album.

He concluded positively, stating that Grande is a "pop star [...] finally working out who they are and what they want to say" and compared the album to Rihanna's Anti.

[40] Helen Brown from The Independent stated that Grande is "embracing her inner mean girl (on the sexy "Break Up with Your Girlfriend, I'm Bored") [and] owning her flaws and contradictions" on tracks such as "Needy" and "NASA", yet concluded that the album lacks enough "vocal grit".

He criticized that "some of the [...] tracks tend to blur together", but ultimately concluded in saying that Grande's "refusal to fake a smile that proves to be what makes her so damn likeable.

"[101] In a capsule review for Vice, Robert Christgau gave the album a three-star honorable mention () and summed it up as Grande's "maturing from multitracked studio trickeration to straight love songs—love songs an old grouch might complain are all too superstar-specific"; the title track and "Ghostin'" were cited as highlights.

[105] Billboard complimented Grande's liberation to guilt, emotional restraint and independence, they said "in the aftermath of her personal struggles from that year, she found solace in the studio, sipping champagne with her friends and collaborators, while writing and recording the best album of her career in just two weeks".

Billboard also noted that of the 20 largest album streaming weeks at the time, Thank U, Next was the only non-hip hop title present.