The nail-biting extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate 51M watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game series recorded 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen various tongues.
