The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-game World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
