Fall Classic Final Game Captures 51M Viewers Across the US, Canada and Japanese Regions.
The exciting extended matchup where the Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a combined over 50 million viewers across the United States, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched Fall Classic finale since the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest averaged 27.33M audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the previous week.
It also stands as the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition final game between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This marks a 16% improvement over the previous finale featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million viewers.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game ranked 4th, the fourth game was seventh, the fifth game came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in 13th place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million viewers. This came after the previous Friday’s sixth game – where World Series Most Valuable Player Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – averaged 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Overall Totals and Trends
The entire seven-match World Series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent rise from last year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance since 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded viewership increases for two consecutive years.
Including the Game 1 telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1 million. The overall World Series viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels recorded 8.09M watchers, an eight percent increase over the previous year and the network’s best playoff performance after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball announced that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 countries and territories by 44 media partners in sixteen different languages.
