The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million spectators in the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US viewership reached over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s strongest postseason performance after 2017.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
