The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51 million viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB announced this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last finale between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American average reached over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
