The thrilling extended contest that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51M spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
