The song was written by the Weeknd alongside producers Emmanuel "Mano" Nickerson and Illangelo, with Belly receiving additional writing credits.

In the United States, "The Hills" reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, replacing his own "Can't Feel My Face", and topped the chart for a total of six weeks.

Elsewhere, "The Hills" reached number one in his native Canada, and charted in multiple territories, including the top ten in the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and Ireland.

[4] In an interview with Paul Tingen, Illangelo stated that the song was their way of going back to the style of the Weeknd's first mixtapes with "a pop arrangement and chords in a faster tempo".

Billboard wrote, "His recent singles ditched his murky sound for shinier, poppier fare, but R&B outlier The Weeknd goes back to basics with "The Hills," an ode to druggy, illicit booty calls.

"[8] Brian Mansfield of USA Today noted that "when a song takes its hook from a horror film—Wes Craven's 1977 cult classic The Hills Have Eyes—you know there's bound to be trouble".

[9] In an analytical piece for Pitchfork, Hannah Giorgis called "The Hills" "a dark, almost discordant meditation on lust, drugs, and fame" while noting that "to those familiar with his repertoire, the only twist in 'The Hills' is how it ends: as the final chords fade, a woman's voice, syrupy and sedate, closes with a lullaby of sorts—not in English, but in Amharic, the primary language of Ethiopia and the Weeknd's own native tongue".

She continues, writing that "the familiarity of Tesfaye's strained vibrato makes him the inheritor of musical legacies that Abyssinia has birthed for generations..."[10] Rolling Stone ranked "The Hills" at number 11 on its "50 best songs of 2015" list: "The Weeknd's second Number One smash of 2015 is much more like the guy we knew from his old mixtapes: Horror-movie shrieks and stormy electronics punctuate his seductive moans about a nihilistic affair, and somehow it's all catchy as hell.

"[13] Stereogum ranked it at number 11 on its "The 50 Best Pop Songs Of 2015" list: "With "Earned It" and "Can't Feel My Face," Abel Tesfaye climbed the charts by moving his sound toward the center.

[17] On December 9, 2015, Cutting Edge Music filed a lawsuit against Tesfaye, the producers of the track, and the labels who released the song, for allegedly using the bassline from the score of the film The Machine.

[20] Its debut was overwhelmingly powered by first-week digital download sales of 109,000 copies and 5.2 million domestic streams, aided by the simultaneous premiere of its music video on the single's release date.

It was uploaded to YouTube on May 27, 2015, and features a cameo from Rick Wilder, who also appears in both the "Can't Feel My Face" and "Tell Your Friends" music videos.

As the song progresses, the Weeknd is seen walking by himself down South June Street in Los Angeles,[26] and at the beginning of the second chorus, the wrecked Town Car explodes behind him.

[28] It is a 360-degree virtual reality video in which the Weeknd is seen leaving a venue and heading to his limo (taking him to the afterparty featured in an Apple Music commercial, with John Travolta[29][30] as his driver).

[38] On August 9, 2016, a remix was released by the Belgian DJ duo, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike, as one of the free downloads of their "Summer of Madness" tracks.