The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB reported this marks the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US average reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged over 8 million viewers, an eight percent rise over last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
