The nail-biting 11-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate over 50 million watchers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest secured over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total American viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an 8% rise over last year and the network’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
