The exciting 11-inning clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total 51M viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete US average was 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest postseason performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
