The thrilling extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball stated this marks the most-watched World Series finale since the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic game secured over 27 million viewers on Fox channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% increase compared to the previous Game 7 between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports. This made it the most-watched English-language program in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game started at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched World Series game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series recorded over 15.7 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on the Univision network, the complete American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series average in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09M viewers, an eight percent increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
