The exciting extended matchup where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate over 50 million watchers in the US, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen various languages.
