The exciting extended clash that saw the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB announced this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
