The exciting 11-inning matchup where the Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51 million viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Viewership Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic game drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms. Per Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19M.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked fourth, Game 4 was seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and Game 3 finished in thirteenth place.
Global Viewership Figures
In Canada, the climactic game drew 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English program in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after last Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew 15.71M viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two consecutive years.
Counting the opening game broadcast on Univision, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the World Series was televised in over 200 nations and regions by 44 media partners in sixteen different tongues.
