The exciting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s best playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
