Although it was released too late in 1955 to be eligible for Oscar® nominations, Guys and Dolls was one of the top money-making pictures of its year, a distinction shared by only five other movie musicals. Of all Goldwyn's pictures, only The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) grossed more at the box office. Guys and Dolls was also a huge international hit for Goldwyn and its releasing studio MGM, rivaling the company's overseas records set by Gone with the Wind (1939).

Guys and Dolls won Academy Award® nominations for Best Cinematography, Color (Harry Stradling), Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture (Jay Blackton, Cyril J. Mockridge), Best Art Direction (Joseph C. Wright/Art Direction, Howard Bristol/Set Decoration), Best Costume Design (Irene Sharaff)

It also won Golden Globes for Best Motion Picture/Musical or Comedy and Best Actress/Musical or Comedy (Jean Simmons).

Guys and Dolls was nominated by the British Academy as Best Film from Any Source and for Best Foreign Actress (Jean Simmons was a British actress but was appearing in an American production). Mankiewicz also received a nomination for Best Written American Musical from the Writers Guild of America.

For the film's release, producer Sam Goldwyn made his biggest promotional push ever, with publicity photos by Richard Avedon and musical numbers performed on The Ed Sullivan Show. The Goldwyn Girls (the producer's trademark chorus) were sent on a world tour. Echoing the promo line of Ninotchka (1939) - "Garbo Laughs!" - Goldwyn used the tagline "Brando Sings!" to note his star's first musical performance. Even the press-shy Brando got into the act, giving interviews and attending the film's premiere, although he regretted his decision when he and Simmons were mobbed at the New York premiere. Brando was almost strangled when a fan grabbed hold of his necktie, and once inside the theater, he found he had been served a subpoena to testify in a court case involving his film On the Waterfront (1954). When he had enough of the promotional grind, Brando told reporters at one press conference that the picture was "nothing to get on your tricycle about."

"Brando acts with personality and conviction and sings pleasantly; Jean Simmons is surprisingly appealing as Sarah Brown, a part with almost no potential. Both could give lessons to most of the more polished voices in Hollywood on how to act a lyric. The real hero of the picture is Stubby Kaye (who) does more to create the atmosphere of Runyon's New York than all the scenery lumped together" - Stephen Sondheim, Films in Review

"A Sam-dandy of a picture show, a 158-minute blur of unmitigated energy, and one of the year's best musicals." - Time, November 14, 1955

"I'm not sure whether it is the Goldwyn touch or the Mankiewicz stamp that has been put on "the film", but of one thing I am certain: the two should collaborate more often." - Hollis Alpert, Saturday Review

"The biggest news is this: Goldwyn gambles and wins! The film retains the purity of the Broadway musical (and) Joseph L. Mankiewicz, writer and director of the movie, has kept most of the funny lines and added some of his own.....Mankiewicz has caught the tenderness that lies unsuspected beneath their striped coats, pointed lapels, and black shirts. Guys and Dolls is a superior musical." - William K. Zinsser, The New York Herald Tribune

"Samuel Goldwyn was playing an odds-on favorite when he plunked $5,000,000 to make a film of Guys and Dolls (and) the gamble this time has paid off richly....Under the guidance of director Mankiewicz, this musical comedy classic gets a great ride all the way." - Bosley Crowther, The New York Times (Crowther also included the film in his "second ten" of his year-end "Ten Best" list.)

"The Detroit role is a breeze for Frank Sinatra, and he plays it as casually as if he were eating a banana split, stopping only long enough to put an extra throb into his voice for the one tune added to the original Frank Loesser score, "Adelaide." - Louella O. Parsons, The Los Angeles Examiner

"Sinatra as Detroit takes great pride in trivialities and his mind is forever seeking angles. He is always a man and never a buffoon. And, of course, the way he can tailor a Frank Loesser song is nobody's business but his own." - Jack Moffitt, The Hollywood Reporter

"Brando and Simmons....are as competent song-and-dance people as in their past straight romantic credits. They make believable the offbeat romance between the gambler and the spirited servant of the gospel." - Abel, Variety, November 2, 1955