The exciting extended matchup where the Los Angeles Dodgers overcome the Toronto Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a aggregate 51M viewers in the United States, Canada, and Japanese territories. MLB stated this represents the highest-rated Fall Classic finale since the 1991 edition contest featuring the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable contest averaged over 27 million audience members on Fox channels, Fox Deportes and their streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally stands as the most-watched Fall Classic game after the 2017 final game involving the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which drew over 29 million. This represents a sixteen percent improvement compared to the previous finale featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million viewers.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was seventh, Game 5 was 8th, and the third game finished in thirteenth place.
International Audience Figures
In Canada, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports channel. This made it the highest-rated English-language program in the country after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12 million viewers. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has seen viewership increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the complete American viewership was over 16 million. The total World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in Canada.
The full MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise over the previous year and Fox’s best playoff ratings after 2017.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was televised in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
