The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate over 50 million spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership was 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
