The thrilling extended clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
International Audience 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 program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
