The nail-biting extended clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51 million watchers in the US, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB reported this is the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American average was 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
