World Series Final Game Draws 51M Viewers Across the United States, Canada and Japanese Regions.
The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51M watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB stated this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase over the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen various tongues.
