"Let's Dance" was described by Ed Power in the "Irish Examiner" as "a decent chunk of funk-rock". Writing for the BBC, David Quantick said "the combination of Bowie and Rodgers on the title track was perfect – Bowie's epic lyric about dancing under 'serious moonlight' and the brilliant filching of the crescendo 'ahh!'s from the Beatles' version of the Isley Brothers' 'Twist and Shout' were masterstrokes, each welded to a loud, stadium-ised drum and bass sound". In his retrospective review of the "Let's Dance" album, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic called the song, along with "Modern Love" and "China Girl", a "catchy, accessible song that has just enough of an alien edge to make distinctive". In his AllMusic review of the song, Dave Thompson writes, "[the song is one of Bowie's most overtly commercial compositions, further blessed by one of his most simplistic lyrics – the sociological content with which the song has historically been credited derives entirely from the accompanying video, as opposed to a lyric which does little more than repeat the title around scattered invocations of "serious moonlight" and scarlet footwear."