The exciting 11-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest drew over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series averaged 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete US viewership was 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in sixteen different languages.
