The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US viewership was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen various languages.
