The thrilling 11-inning contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
