The exciting 11-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51M spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Including the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
