World Series Final Game Draws 51M Audience Members Across the United States, Canadian and Japan Markets.
The thrilling extra-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51 million watchers in the US, Canadian, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total American average was over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen various tongues.
