The nail-biting extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB stated this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
