The nail-biting 11-inning clash where the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this represents the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series drew over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. 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 viewership was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
