The thrilling extended contest that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined 51 million watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. MLB announced this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase over last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
