The nail-biting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a total 51M spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match World Series drew 15.71M audience members on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total American average was over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.
