The nail-biting extended matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series recorded 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US average reached over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
