The thrilling extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series averaged 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s best playoff ratings since 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
