The nail-biting extra-inning clash where the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total 51 million spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB reported this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series drew 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% rise over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
