The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12M. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Trends
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 marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership increases for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the complete American average reached over 16 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different tongues.
