The nail-biting 11-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game drew 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12M. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan 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 eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best postseason performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
