The exciting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English program in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The full seven-match World Series recorded 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete American average was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M 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 strongest postseason performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
