The thrilling 11-inning clash that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate 51M viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US average reached 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s best playoff ratings since 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
