The thrilling extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined over 50 million spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB announced this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American average was 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen various languages.
