The thrilling extra-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 drew a combined over 50 million watchers in the United States, Canadian, and Japanese territories. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic finale after the 1991 edition showdown between the Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday memorable game averaged 27.33 million audience members on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It additionally stands as the top-rated Fall Classic game after the 2017 edition Game 7 between the Dodgers and Astros, which drew 29.07M. This represents a 16% increase compared to the last finale between the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game ranked 7th, Game 5 came in eighth, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Viewership Figures
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding game began at 9 PM local time, it averaged 12M. This came after last Friday’s sixth game – where Fall Classic Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged 13.1 million spectators, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a single network in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-match series averaged over 15.7 million viewers on Fox, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time since 2015 and ‘16 that the World Series has recorded audience growth for two straight seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American average reached 16.1M. The total World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels recorded over 8 million watchers, an eight percent increase over last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the Fall Classic was televised in 203 nations and regions by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various languages.
