The exciting extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51 million spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different tongues.
