Fall Classic Game 7 Attracts Over 50 Million Audience Members In the US, Canada and Japan Markets.
The thrilling extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run drew a total over 50 million spectators across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series game since the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US viewership was 16.1M. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
