The thrilling extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays by one run attracted a total 51M viewers across the US, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB announced this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 was 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language program in Canada after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – recorded over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance since the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
