The exciting extended contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a combined over 50 million watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – recorded over 13 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series drew over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership was 16.1M. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 various languages.
