The exciting extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American average was 16.1M. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen various tongues.
