World Series Final Game Draws 51M Audience Members Across the United States, Canadian and Japanese Markets.
The exciting extended matchup that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Blue Jays 5-4 attracted a aggregate 51M viewers across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. MLB stated this marks the highest-rated World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game secured 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This marks a sixteen percent increase compared to the previous finale between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding game began at 9 p.m. local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – 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.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-match series recorded 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive years.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total US viewership was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded over 8 million viewers, an 8% rise compared to last year and Fox’s best playoff performance after 2017.
MLB announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
