The reviews lean towards a mixed reception, with most critics finding some laughs in Police Academy’s goofy recruits and clashes with authority. Praise centres on its affable, often innocent humour and supporting performances: Variety singles out Michael Winslow’s human sound effects, while Empire finds the comedy consistently funny and argues that it deserves more respect than its reputation allows. Even the qualified responses find something appealing in its silliness.
The reservations concern uneven jokes, fragmented writing and the point at which broad humour becomes merely crude. Vulture accepts the messiness for the sake of the charm, whereas The New York Times finds the gags more crude than amusing. The spread is fairly wide, though enthusiasm is less common than qualification; the evidence also has limits, with one verdict unverifiable and two others represented only by partial text.