The thrilling extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51M spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was 16.1M. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
