The thrilling 11-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership was over 16 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s best postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
