Fall Classic Game 7 Draws 51 Million Audience Members In the United States, Canadian and Japan Markets.
The nail-biting 11-inning contest that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51 million spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. MLB stated this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 after the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, Fox Deportes and Fox’s digital services. Per Nielsen, it was the second most-watched broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase over the previous Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, Game 6 ranked 4th, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game finished in 13th position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded over 11 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest started at 9 PM in the local time zone, it attracted 12 million. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where World Series MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – recorded 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 15.71 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M watchers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
MLB announced that the World Series was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
