The exciting extended contest where the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a total over 50 million spectators in the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
