The exciting extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total US average reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
