The nail-biting 11-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
