The exciting extra-inning clash where the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this is the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic game averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a 16% improvement over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
