The exciting extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a total 51M spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic 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 drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
