The thrilling extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33M 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 previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-match series drew 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
