The thrilling 11-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51M viewers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement over the last Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series averaged 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US average was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best postseason performance since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 different languages.
