The exciting 11-inning contest where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise over last year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since 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 languages.
