The nail-biting extended contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51M watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. MLB stated this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a 16% improvement over the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff performance since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
