The nail-biting 11-inning contest where the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51M viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase compared to the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English program in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen various tongues.
