The nail-biting extended contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB announced this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American average reached 16.1M. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.
