The nail-biting extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American average was over 16 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million viewers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various tongues.
