The exciting extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51 million watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American average was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise over last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
