The nail-biting extra-inning matchup that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined over 50 million spectators in the United States, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic game averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game landed in 13th position.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million 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 Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete US viewership was over 16 million. The overall World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an eight percent rise over last year and the network’s strongest playoff performance after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
