The exciting extra-inning contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate over 50 million spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
