The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51 million viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series drew 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US average reached over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
