The thrilling extra-inning clash that saw the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a total 51M watchers across the US, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable game drew 27.33M viewers on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game finished in 13th position.
International Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was over 16 million. The total Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09 million viewers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance since the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by forty-four media partners in sixteen different tongues.
