The nail-biting 11-inning matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run drew a total over 50 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. MLB stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday memorable contest secured 27.33M viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a 16% improvement compared to the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 finished in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game drew 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English program in the country after the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final game began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete American viewership was over 16 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest playoff performance after the 2017 season.
MLB reported that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 media partners in 16 different languages.
