The nail-biting extended matchup that saw the Dodgers defeat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in the country after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched World Series game on a single network in Japan.
Overall Totals and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series recorded 15.71 million viewers on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience increases for two straight seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on Univision, the complete American viewership reached over 16 million. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an 8% increase over last year and the network’s best playoff performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
