The nail-biting extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a combined over 50 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33M audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
