World Series Game 7 Captures Over 50 Million Audience Members Across the US, Canada and Japan Markets.
The nail-biting extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a total 51 million viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this marks the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s memorable contest averaged 27.33M viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This was the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series averaged 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete American average was 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged over 8 million watchers, an 8% rise over the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
