The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined over 50 million spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US average was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
