The nail-biting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate 51M watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American average reached over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different tongues.
