The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this represents the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable game secured over 27 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th position.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game drew 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series drew 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09 million watchers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
