The exciting extended contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen various languages.
