The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51M viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
