The exciting extended contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run drew a total over 50 million viewers across the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. MLB reported this represents the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a single network in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series averaged 15.71M audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the total US average was over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over last year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different tongues.
