The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball reported this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. 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 American viewership was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
