The exciting extra-inning contest where the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51 million spectators across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the most-watched World Series finale after the 1991 showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Broadcast Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest averaged 27.33 million viewers on Fox networks, its Spanish-language channel and their streaming platforms. Per ratings data, it was the second most-watched program of the week.
It also is the top-rated World Series matchup since the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a sixteen percent increase over the last finale featuring the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the weekly rankings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Numbers
In Canada, the game averaged 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This made it the most-watched English broadcast in Canada after the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it drew 12M. This came after the previous Friday’s Game 6 – where World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed a single run in six innings – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic matchup on a single network in Japan.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The full seven-match World Series averaged 15.71M audience members on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has seen viewership growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the total US average was 16.1M. The overall World Series average in Japan was 9.7M and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% increase compared to the previous year and the network’s best postseason performance since 2017.
MLB announced that the World Series was broadcast in 203 countries and territories by forty-four broadcasting partners in sixteen different tongues.
