The thrilling extra-inning matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run attracted a aggregate 51M viewers in the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12M. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American average reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
