The exciting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate 51M watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last finale between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
