The thrilling extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51M viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12M. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase over the previous year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
