World Series Game 7 Attracts 51M Viewers Across the United States, Canada and Japanese Markets.
The nail-biting extended matchup where the Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51 million viewers in the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball reported this represents the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 showdown between the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s memorable contest secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to ratings data, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 Game 7 involving the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 ranked 4th, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Audience Numbers
In Canada, the climactic game averaged 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the highest-rated English broadcast in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it averaged 12 million. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six frames – recorded 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 nations and regions by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
