Following Bowie's death in 2016, "Modern Love" was named as one of Bowie's greatest songs by numerous publications. "Rolling Stone" listed it as one of Bowie's 30 essential songs, writing "[the song] reveals Bowie at his catchiest and most nihilistic." "Ultimate Classic Rock", in their list of Bowie's 10 greatest songs, listed it at number eight, labeling it the best "pop song" of Bowie's career, praising its spoken intro and its "infectious chorus". In 2018, the writers of "NME" listed "Modern Love" as Bowie's eighth greatest song. They noted the "tragic irony" to the track, in that it is not about how Bowie managed to "make a perfect song about his cynicism at the world", but rather that his "prescient observations" of the 1980s music industry exposed the "hollowness" of his 1980s works.