Although Refused broke up only months after the album's release, The Shape of Punk to Come has since found an audience for the band and largely contributed to their posthumous fame, as well as inspiring many later artists in a wide range of genres.

The philosophy of the album, expounded in the ample liner notes and encapsulated in the song "New Noise", was that punk and hardcore music could not be anti-establishment by continuing to package revolutionary lyrics in sounds which had been increasingly co-opted into the mainstream.

which followed the album, is a tactic that various members of Refused have credited to the influence of Philadelphia punk band Ink & Dagger.

[14][better source needed]The album's production has inspired other artists to work with Pelle Henricsson and Eskil Lövström, including Poison the Well,[15] and Hell is for Heroes.

Jalla!, The Hitman's Bodyguard, Boot Camp, Triangle of Sadness, and Friday Night Lights; in the television programs 24, Rage, The Bear, Criminal Minds, Nitro Circus, The Following, and Wayne; in the video game Tony Hawk's Underground; and in the trailers for the movie Witching and Bitching and the video game Doom.

[22] It was also the entrance music for major league pitcher John Axford when he closed games for the Milwaukee Brewers.

features a direct reference to the song "Liberation Frequency" by quoting the lyric "We want the airwaves back."

"Bruitist Pome #5," for example, was thoroughly reworked, while a seven-minute version of "Refused Are Fuckin Dead" transitions into a new second half, which incorporates elements of the Bomba Je Remix of the song.