The thrilling extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s best postseason performance after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
