The exciting 11-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB stated this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. 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 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 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 announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
