The exciting extra-inning contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run attracted a combined 51M watchers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. MLB stated this represents the most-watched World Series Game 7 since the 1991 showdown featuring the Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable game drew over 27 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic game since the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase over the last finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game drew 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in Canada since the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total American average was over 16 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff performance since 2017.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different languages.
