The thrilling extra-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51 million spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this is the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
