The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series recorded 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
