The nail-biting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total over 50 million spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked fourth, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the game recorded over 11 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match series drew 15.71M viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M watchers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen various tongues.
