The nail-biting extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a total 51M spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. MLB reported this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest averaged over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series game since the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement over the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience 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 program in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast 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 the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an 8% rise over last year and the network’s best postseason performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen various languages.
