The exciting extended contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M spectators in the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a 16% improvement over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked fourth, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game broadcast on Univision, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
