The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total over 50 million watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
