The thrilling extended matchup where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate over 50 million viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-game World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1M. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
