World Series Final Game Captures 51M Audience Members Across the United States, Canadian and Japanese Markets.
The exciting extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different languages.
