The nail-biting extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB announced this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total US average reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million viewers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
