The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51M watchers in the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American average was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
