The exciting 11-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a total over 50 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
