Critically and commercially successful on release, the film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Stanley Kubrick, Herr and Hansford.

Critical reviews for the film were largely positive with main praise going to its direction, performances and character dialogue. Richard Corliss of Time called the film a “technical knockout”, praising “the dialogue’s wild, desperate wit; the daring in choosing a desultory skirmish to make a point about war’s pointlessness”, and “the fine, large performances of almost every actor” especially from Ermey and D’Onofrio. More than anything, he appreciated the “Olympian elegance and precision of Kubrick’s filmmaking.” Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader called it “Elliptical, full of subtle inner rhymes… and profoundly moving… the most tightly crafted Kubrick film… as well as the most horrific” while Jim Hall wrote for Film4 that the film, along with Dr. Strangelove is “one of Kubrick’s very best”.

#5 in Channel 4’s 2011 list of The Greatest War Films Ever Made, #19 in The Guardian’s 2010 list of 25 Best Action and War Films of All Time, #95 in “AFI’s 100 Years… 100 Thrills” and #457 in Empire’s 2008 list of The 500 Greatest Films of All Time.

Today, it stands on Rotten Tomatoes at 92% with its critical consensus stating that the film is “Intense, tightly constructed, and darkly comic at times” and that while it “may not boast the most original of themes… it is exceedingly effective at communicating them.”