The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51M watchers across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-game World Series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total American average reached 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance after 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
