The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen different languages.
