In a positive review for Rolling Stone magazine, music critic Stephen Holden viewed Breakfast in America as an improvement over the "swatches of meandering, Genesis-like esoterica" on Supertramp's previous albums, and called it "a textbook-perfect album of post-Beatles, keyboard-centered English art rock that strikes the shrewdest possible balance between quasi-symphonic classicism and rock & roll ... the songs here are extraordinarily melodic and concisely structured, reflecting these musicians' saturation in American pop since their move to Los Angeles in 1977." Village Voice critic Robert Christgau was less impressed, saying that the "hooky album" evokes "random grunts of pleasure" but lacks emotional substance because of "glib" lyrics and no "vocal personality (as opposed to accurate singing) and rhythmic thrust (as opposed to a beat)".
Colin Larkin, writing in the Encyclopedia of Popular Music (2006), said that the "faultless" album "elevated" Supertramp to "rock's first division".
In a retrospective review for AllMusic, Stephen Thomas Erlewine praised the album's "tightly written, catchy, well-constructed pop songs" and described it as the band's "high-water mark". Sputnikmusic's Tyler Fisher said that its singles are mostly the highlights because of their "catchy hooks", and found the ballads "absolutely terrible". Rob Sheffield, writing in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), also felt that its "nice moments" were the highlights, including "the jolly 'Take the Long Way Home,' the adjectively crazed 'Logical Song,' [and] 'Goodbye Stranger.'" William Pinfold of Record Collector considered the album "a classic example of flawlessly-played and -produced late 70s transatlantic soft rock". In the 1994 edition of The Guinness All Time Top 1000 Albums, Breakfast in America was voted No. 207 in the all-time greatest rock and pop albums, and it was voted the 69th-greatest British rock album of all time in a 2006 Classic Rock industry poll. Triple M listeners voted the album No. 43 in the "100 Greatest Albums of All Time". Recognising the band's disfavour among music critics during their career, Q magazine ranked Breakfast in America second on its "Records it's OK to Love" list in 2006.
In 2000 it was voted No. 294 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums.
"The Logical Song" won the 1979 Ivor Novello Award for "Best Song Musically and Lyrically".
Track listing
2010 Deluxe Edition
Reissues
;1990 Remaster
In June 1990, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab re-released a remaster on Ultradisc™ 24 KT Gold CD from their "Original Master Recording" Collection.
;2002 reissue
On 11 June 2002, A&M Records reissued Breakfast in America with full original album art, plus the label art from side one recreated on the CD. It was mastered from the original master tapes by Greg Calbi and Jay Messina at Sterling Sound, New York, 2002. The reissue was supervised by Bill Levenson with art direction by Vartan and design by Mike Diehl, with production coordination by Beth Stempel. It makes limited use of dynamic range compression and peak limiting, rejecting the loudness war trends of modern CD releases.
;2010 Deluxe Edition
A deluxe edition was released on 4 October 2010, including a second disc with songs recorded live in 1979, in particular songs not appearing on the live album Paris.
;2010 Super Deluxe Edition
A super deluxe edition, which was released on 6 December 2010, includes the 2-disc deluxe edition CD, vinyl LP, poster, DVD, hardcover book, and other memorabilia.
;2013 Blu-ray high definition disc
A&M offers a High Definition Blu-ray Disc of the album. It contains the album in three different sound formats: 2-Channel PCM 24bit/96 kHz, 2 Channel DTS-HD Master Audio 24bit/96 kHz and 2-Channel Dolby TrueHD 24bit/96 kHz. This High Definition Blu-ray Disc is playable in all Blu-ray Disc players.
;2018 Remastered Hybrid SACD
On 17 May 2018, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab re-released a remaster on hybrid SACD.
;2026 Half-speed master LP
On 23 January 2026, a half-speed master reissue of Breakfast in America was announced. It was released on 20 March 2026. The album lacquer was cut by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios and overseen by co-producer Peter Henderson.
Personnel
Supertramp
- Rick Davies – vocals and keyboards including clavinet on track 2
- Roger Hodgson – vocals, keyboards and guitars including acoustic 12-string guitar on track 2
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! scope="row" | Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)
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! scope="row"| Finnish Albums (The Official Finnish Charts)
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!scope="row"|Italian Albums (Musica e dischi)
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!scope="row"|Japanese Albums (Oricon)
| align="center"| 2
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!scope="row"|Spanish Albums (AFYVE)
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!Chart (2000-05)
!Position
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!Chart (2010-15)
!Position
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!Chart (2019)
!Position
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!Chart (2026)
!Position
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! scope="row"| German Rock & Metal Albums (Offizielle Top 100)
| 11
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Year-end charts
{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center;"
|+ Year-end chart performance for Breakfast in America
!Chart (1979)
!Position
|-
!scope="row"|Australian Albums Chart (Kent Music Report)
|2
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!scope="row"|French Albums (SNEP)
|2
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!scope="row"|Japanese Albums (Oricon)
|29
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!scope="row"|UK Albums (OCC)
|4
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!scope="row"|US Billboard 200
|5
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{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center;"
!Chart (1980)
!Position
|-
!scope="row"|Canada Top Albums/CDs (RPM)
|44
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!scope="row"|US Billboard 200
|21
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Deluxe edition
{|class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders"
!Chart (2010)
!Peak<br>position
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