The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate over 50 million watchers in the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total American average was 16.1 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
