The thrilling extra-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate 51M spectators across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement over the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
