The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English program in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
