The thrilling extra-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
