The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51 million spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.