The exciting extended contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51M spectators in the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
