The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51M viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.