The nail-biting extra-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance since 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
