Fall Classic Game 7 Captures 51 Million Audience Members Across the United States, Canadian and Japan Markets.
The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-game series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership was 16.1M. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and the network’s best playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
