The nail-biting extra-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a aggregate 51 million watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan territories. MLB reported this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest secured 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also is the most-watched World Series game after the 2017 final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth position.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a single network in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various tongues.
