The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million watchers in the US, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game secured over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
