The exciting extra-inning clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined 51 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the most-watched World Series Game 7 after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable game secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Figures
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew 15.71M audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
