The thrilling extended contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 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 Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American average reached over 16 million. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
