The exciting 11-inning contest where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run drew a combined 51 million spectators across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
