The nail-biting extra-inning contest that saw the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was over 16 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
