The soundtrack album sold over 135,000 copies. Critical opinion of the soundtrack was mixed. Some reviewers, such as Ben Schweitzer of RPGFan, found it to be of medium quality, saying it "suffer from occasional compositional problems" and noted that others refer to it as simply "in the middle" of the soundtracks of "Final Fantasy IV" and "Final Fantasy VI", though he stated "I don't know why I love Final Fantasy V's music" despite this. Schweitzer praised the "Main Theme of Final Fantasy V" ("Ahead on Our Way") as "a truly stirring piece of music" and "triumphant, hopeful, and yet almost longing at the same time," but stated that "Uematsu's compositional style hits a sort of early plateau here." Other reviewers disagreed, with Jason Strohmaier of Soundtrack Central finding it to be an underrated album, while Jeremy Althouse of Soundtrack Central felt that it was on par with Uematsu's other works.