The thrilling extra-inning clash where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51M viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two straight years.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1M. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
