The exciting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51M watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series averaged 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1 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, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
