The nail-biting extra-inning clash where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51M viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise over last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings since 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
