The song received universal acclaim from critics. Alex Denney "NME" called the song the "heart-rending highlight" of "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" and cited the vocal performance by Vernon as a "quite brilliant effect." Denney commented "it frames Kanye’s inner demons in a universal way, recasting Vernon’s semi-mythical woodland retreat as his own cipher for spiritual replenishment". "Los Angeles Times" writer Ann Powers called the song an important piece of the album, saying that the sampling of Bon Iver was both surprising and inspired, and noted the differences between "Woods" and "Lost in the World". David Amidon of PopMatters viewed that the track contained "glass-shattering bass", and viewed that the track "storms out of all this dreariness with a thunderous, plodding house bass and Kanye taking Bon Iver in every which direction as the song exudes nothing but triumph." Chris Martins of "Spin" stated that West managed to transform Iver's "melancholic 'Woods' into a perversely bright experimental dance track." Sasha Frere-Jones of "The New Yorker" commented that the song was difficult to classify as purely a rap song, noting that "West’s music is born of hip-hop, but it now includes so many varieties that it feels most accurate to call it simply Kanye." Jones noted than in less than the six minutes of the song's running time, West "moves from a loner in the woods to his own isolation and on to the entire African-American experience."