Many critics and publicators named "Watch the Throne" to their year-end best-of lists. A few notable examples are The Rolling Stone" and The Washington Post. The album debuted at number 1 on the Billboard 200. This is because the album sold 436,000 copies in the first week. It also broke the iTunes first week sales record at the same time. Because of this, it was the fourth top selling album on iTunes in 2011. It also reached the top 10 in a few countries. Examples are Canada and the United Kingdom. It was also certified quintuple platinum in the United States by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) in November 2020.