The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51 million viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
