The thrilling extended contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51M viewers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 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 Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different languages.
