The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51M viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US average was 16.1M. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different languages.
