The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday epic contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different languages.
