The thrilling 11-inning matchup where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew over 27 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 after the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 was 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series recorded 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total American average was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
MLB stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in 16 various tongues.
