The thrilling 11-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB reported this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their 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 Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-game World Series recorded 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
