The exciting 11-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series drew 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
