The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this represents the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable game averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth 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 broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership reached 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 different tongues.
