6.2 million American viewers. The show claimed a 2.8 rating/7 share among viewers aged 18 to 49, meaning that 2.8 percent of all people in that group, and 7 percent of all people from that group watching television at the time, watched the episode. Jack Burditt and Robert Carlock received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series for their work on "Kidney Now!", but they lost it to fellow 30 Rock writer Matt Hubbard for the episode "Reunion" at the 61st Primetime Emmy Awards. At the same awards show, Tony Pipitone and Griffin Richardson were nominated for a Creative Arts Emmy Award for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (half-hour) and Animation. IGN contributor Robert Canning wrote that the ending from this episode "did have a season finale feel to it with the big musical number. [...] Still, it was a great season, and I loved going out with two of the best characters on TV summing up the moment perfectly – Liz: 'We sure had quite a year.' Jack: 'What are you talking about? It's May.'" Canning gave it an 8.5 out of 10 rating. Television columnist Alan Sepinwall for The Star-Ledger wrote that the "all-star cast of musicians" featured were not able to dominate the episode "to the point where the episode didn't work." Sepinwall, however, added that despite "Kidney Now!" not being a classic 30 Rock episode "it was [still] funny enough – which, I suppose, also makes it an appropriate finale for this uneven season." Further in the review, Sepinwall was complimentary towards Liz's plot, writing that the character's sequence on The Vontella Show was "hilarious, and a fine demonstration of how much confidence Tina Fey has gained as an actress over the years." The A.V. Club’s Nathan Rabin also enjoyed the Liz character, reporting that she "delivered a virtuoso performance in [The Vontella Show], instantly homing in on the fatal flaw in every relationship and obliterating it with highly quotable sass." In discussion to Tracy's plot, Rabin opined it was the "weakest of the various threads" in this episode. Bob Sassone of AOL's TV Squad confessed in his recap that he was going to summarize "Kidney Now!" as "a little disappointing, but then I hit rewind on my DVR and watched it again and realized, wow, they actually hit all of the season finale notes rather perfectly