The exciting extended contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete American viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
