The thrilling extended contest that saw the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a combined over 50 million viewers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball reported this represents the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th place.
Global Viewership Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged over 11 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series averaged 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the total US average reached 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent rise over the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
