The nail-biting extended clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-match series drew 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership reached 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
