The exciting 11-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American average reached over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
