The exciting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various languages.