The exciting extended clash where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined over 50 million spectators in the US, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB reported this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series recorded 15.71M audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different languages.
