World Series Final Game Draws 51M Audience Members Across the US, Canada and Japanese Regions.
The nail-biting 11-inning contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51M watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB stated this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English 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 averaged 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s best postseason performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
