The nail-biting 11-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51M viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest drew 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best playoff performance after 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
