The thrilling extended clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51M viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American average reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
