The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a total 51M watchers across the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this is the highest-rated World Series finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the week.
It also stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last finale between the Washington Nationals and Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked seventh, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game landed in 13th place.
Global Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game averaged over 11 million viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in the country since the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed one run in six frames – averaged 13.1M viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game World Series recorded over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This marks the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen audience growth for two straight seasons.
Including the Game 1 broadcast on Univision, the complete US average was 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 recorded 8.09 million watchers, an eight percent increase over last year and Fox’s best postseason ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball announced that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different languages.
