The nail-biting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English program in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-game World Series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total American average was 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
