The nail-biting extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total 51M viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
