The nail-biting extra-inning clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB stated this represents the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
