The thrilling 11-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51 million spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest secured over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total US average reached 16.1M. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
