The nail-biting extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition Game 7 involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total US average reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s best 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 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
