The exciting 11-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a total over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 different tongues.
