The exciting extended clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M viewers across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series averaged 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was over 16 million. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
