The thrilling 11-inning contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a total 51M spectators across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American average was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
