One of the noteworthy aspects to the criticism of Will in the World is that there is so much of it. The book has drawn an enormous amount of notice for a book by a literary critic and about a literary topic. Within months of its publication, it had been featured in most book review sections of newspapers and magazines in the United States and England. Overall, this criticism has been favorable. That is, it has received far more positive reviews than negative ones. For some critics, Greenblatt has written the best of the Shakespeare biographies, surpassing his predecessors through his insightful connections between Shakespeare's life and his works. Typical of these is Adam Gopnik, who reviewed Will in the World for the New Yorker:

Greenblatt's book is startlingly good—the most complexly intelligent and sophisticated, and yet the most keenly enthusiastic, study of the life...