The thrilling extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American average was 16.1 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
