Might Delete Later's release had been hinted at through vlogs published by Cole in the weeks leading up to its release. [2][3][4][5][6] While promoting his upcoming studio album, The Fall Off, on February 21, 2024, J. Cole shared a video titled "Might Delete Later, Vol. 1" that included a snippet of "Crocodile Tearz".[7] Just under a month later, on March 18, J. Cole shared 'Vol. 2" of the vlog, which included a snippet of "3001".[5]
On March 22, 2024, Future and Metro Boomin released their collaborative studio album, We Don't Trust You. The album's sixth track, "Like That", included a verse where featured artist Kendrick Lamardissed J. Cole and Drake in reference to their collaborative track "First Person Shooter" that had been released the year prior.[8][9] J. Cole responded to Lamar's diss on Might Delete Later with "7 Minute Drill", a track Cole later deleted from streaming services after apologizing to Lamar for his response at Dreamville Festival 2024. Lamar and Drake would go on to engage in a rap feud throughout the following weeks.
Controversy
Following the release of the mixtape, Cole faced backlash from fans and reporters after allegedly making what were perceived to be transphobic comments on the project's eighth track, "Pi".[10][11] Some fans perceived the lyrics to be a reference to Kendrick Lamar's "Auntie Diaries", a song where Lamar addresses transphobia and his relationship with his transgender relatives.[12]
Might Delete Later was largely met with mixed critical reception upon release. Writing a positive review for Clash, Robin Murray described how the mixtape's tracks, excluding "7 Minute Drill", feel like "exhilarating dip[s] into some of J. Cole's core tropes". He wrote that the production on the mixtape is "slightly out-of-step with the tape as a whole", but he noted that the production feels more "ingrained" in comparison to Future and Metro Boomin's We Don't Trust You.[13] In a middling review for Pitchfork, Paul A. Thompson wrote that despite "plenty of compelling... rhythmic, textural, and even personal elements" on Might Delete Later, the mixtape's repeated declarations of greatness and demands for recognition are ultimately "rendered vacant and vaguely sad" after Cole's removal of "7 Minute Drill" from the project.[16] Writing a negative review for Sputnikmusic, Dakota West Foss wrote that the mixtape's "bars and punchlines" are those "that scan like [a] parody," saying that Might Delete Later "is a miscalculation at every level" and comparing the project to Chance the Rapper's underwhelming studio album The Big Day. In a play on the project's title, Foss' final consensus was that Cole "should delete [it] now."[15]
Commercial performance
In the United States, Might Delete Later debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 with 115,000 album-equivalent units, which included 137.95 million on-demand streams and 9,000 pure album sales.[17] This earned J. Cole his eighth top-ten entry on the chart, and his first project to not debut at number one since Born Sinner in 2013, which would later end up reaching the top of the chart.
