The nail-biting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete US viewership reached over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 various languages.
