 "The Sweet Escape" received mixed reviews from music critics.At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 58, based on 24 reviews.Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic wrote, "From the stilted production to the fashion fetish, all the way down to her decision to rap on "far" too much of the album, all the dance-pop here seems like a pose."