The thrilling extra-inning clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51M viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership was 16.1 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various languages.
