The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51M spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
