The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51M spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to last year and the network’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
