The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate over 50 million viewers in the US, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB announced this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
