The nail-biting extended clash where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
