The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB reported this is the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 edition showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership reached over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
