The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
