The thrilling extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million watchers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various tongues.
