 Club wrote that "In Reverse" "finds [Sweet] once again at his best", adding that "its 14 tracks are uniformly strong, with muscular rockers ("Split Personality," "Write Your Own Song") competing for attention with smooth, lush, sugary fare ("If Time Permits," the knockout ballads "Trade Places" and "Worse To Live").Stephen Thomas Erlewine, of Allmusic, praised the record's "cavernous reverb", and wrote that "this rich music is a personal interpretation of lush chamber pop and psychedelia, giving a musical counterpart for lovely melancholy songs of heartbreak and disillusion".Jerry McCulley of Amazon.com wrote, "Epic in scope and harmonically intoxicating," adding, "this is an album by an artist measuring the distance between his reach and his grasp, his good sense and self-indulgence, his confidence growing with every back-to-the future track."