The thrilling extra-inning clash that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete US average was 16.1M. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
