The exciting 11-inning clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 different tongues.
