The exciting extra-inning clash that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game averaged 27.33M 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 additionally stands as the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance since 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
