The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate 51M viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason performance after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different tongues.
