The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51M watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen different languages.
