The exciting 11-inning clash where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English program in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
