The exciting extended matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a total 51 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
