The thrilling extended contest that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51M spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached 16.1M. 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 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
