The thrilling extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run drew a total over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American average was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
