The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
