Several reviewers characterized "I Admit" as an act of trolling, since the name of the song overstates the magnitude of the admissions contained within the lyrics. Elyse Wanshel of "HuffPost" noted similarities between this song and "If I Did It", a book by O. J. Simpson that contains a hypothetical description of the alleged murder in Simpson's murder case. Writing for "The Daily Beast", Stereo Williams described the song as "20 minutes of defensive rambling and R. Kelly nailing himself to a cross". Williams asserted that Kelly "paints himself as the victim: the victim of the media, of sycophants, of his childhood abuser, of his own illiteracy" while "baiting his critics with a number of shockingly brazen lyrical references to his behavior".