Have a Nice Life was met with generally favorable reviews reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 75 based on five reviews.[1]
Kellan Miller of XXL praised the album, writing: "'I Miss Mikey' speaks not only to Murs' own deceased homies, but acts as an inspirational call to ignore fears of mortality in the face of death and leave a lasting mark. With Have A Nice Life, an album that will not only impress longtime admirers but newcomers as well, Murs should have no problem with that task".[7]AllMusic's David Jeffries claimed that "every track here punches with a purpose".[2] Andrew Gretchko of HipHopDX stated: "while some may be upset that Murs isn't the unruly rapper he once was, he's managed to craft a project that remains true while growing up enough to talk about life in a radiant, maturity tinged glow".[3] Sy Shackleford of RapReviews dound "some areas of this album [are] a little redundant".[5] Marcus J. Moore of Pitchfork wrote: "as a whole, Have a Nice Life stands as a decent collection of songs that, while palatable, casually floats by in a sea of average beats by Jesse Shatkin, who produced much of the album".[4]
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