The thrilling 11-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen various languages.
