World Series Final Game Captures 51 Million Audience Members In the United States, Canada and Japan Regions.
The nail-biting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51M viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various tongues.