The thrilling 11-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined 51 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this represents the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series averaged 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the total American viewership was 16.1 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to last year and the network’s strongest postseason ratings after 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
