The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the complete American average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different languages.
