The exciting 11-inning contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
