The nail-biting 11-inning matchup where the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51M watchers across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game World Series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s strongest postseason performance after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen various tongues.
