The thrilling extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded over 11 million 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 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it drew 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
