The nail-biting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total 51M watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB announced this is the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase compared to the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
