The nail-biting extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB announced this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – drew 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American average was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.