The exciting 11-inning matchup where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a combined 51 million watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership was 16.1M. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
