The nail-biting extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-match World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen various tongues.
