The nail-biting 11-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51 million spectators in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series matchup after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series recorded 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the complete US average was 16.1M. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
