The exciting 11-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a combined 51M watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million viewers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.
