The exciting extra-inning matchup where the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this is the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started 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 allowed a single run in six frames – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total US viewership reached 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various tongues.
