The nail-biting 11-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a total 51M watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
