The exciting 11-inning clash that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series drew 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
