The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete US average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
