The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total 51M spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
