World Series Final Game Draws Over 50 Million Audience Members In the United States, Canada and Japan Markets.
The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a aggregate 51M spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB announced this marks the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English program in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series averaged 15.71M viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total American average was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different tongues.
