The nail-biting 11-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American average was 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
