The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest drew over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s best playoff performance since 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
