Songfacts®:

• This stripped-back guitar ballad was produced by The Bird and the Bee's Greg Kurstin. As well as this song, The American also collaborated with Adele on "Hello" and " Water Under the Bridge." "I really felt very comfortable around her because she makes you feel that way," Kurstin told The Associated Press. "She's just cool, and then she gets on the microphone and of course blows your mind."
• Adele told i-D that the song only made it to 25 "at the last minute." She added that it will remind people of 19 since "it's just me on guitar."
• The song finds Adele singing about missing her mother, her friends and how people react to her differently now she's famous.
  
  Around the streets where I grew up.
  They can't look me in the eye
  It's like they're scared of me
  I try to think of things to say
  Like a joke or a memory
  But they don't recognise me
  In the light of day
  
  The Observer asked Adele what it feels like to step into a lot of rooms that fall silent? She replied: "It's lonely. It makes you lonely. I mean, I can usually break the ice. If after 10 minutes people still aren't saying anything, I'll crack a joke, and I'll go in to my scared-nervous-chat mode, like I do on stage, and make everyone laugh. But then I feel as if I'm performing. And I don't know if that's… Like… Don't they ever want to meet just me? But then, at the same time I think, they're probably not even there to meet me... I can't explain."
• A number of Turkish Twitter users have accused Adele and Greg Kurstin of plagiarism, claiming that this song bears an uncanny resemblance to the late Kurdish artist Ahmet Kaya's track "Acilara Tutunmak."
  
  Ahmet's widow Gulten Kaya played down their arguments, stating it was unlikely that Adele had stolen her late husband's song.
• In December 2024, a judge in Brazil ordered both Sony and Universal – Adele's labels – to remove "Million Years Ago" from global streaming platforms due to a plagiarism claim by Brazilian composer Toninho Geraes. The claim alleges that "Million Years Ago" plagiarized Geraes' samba song "Mulheres," which was recorded by Martinho da Bila in 1995.