The nail-biting extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51 million watchers in the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US average was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.
