MLB Opens the Season With Gains Across Television, MLB.TV and Digital Media

Padres superstar Fernando Tatis Jr., recipient of the 2020 National League LatinoMVP award - Image Credit: Bill Menzel/Latino Sports

The following was announced by Major League Baseball on Wednesday, April 3rd – MLB Opens the Season With Gains Across Television, MLB.TV and Digital Media; ESPN & FOX Register Double-Digit Viewership Growth from Opening Weekend Coverage Yankees-Astros Opening Day Match-Up is Most-Watched Game Ever on MLB.TV; MLB.TV Scores Most-Watched Four Day Period Ever to Start the 2024 Season

MLB opened the season with a series of records and increases across national and international television, MLB.TV and social media.

National Television

• ESPN’s coverage of MLB’s Opening Night game between the World Champion Texas Rangers and Chicago Cubs, drew the second-largest audience for traditional Opening Day since 2018, averaging 1,578,000 viewers, peaking with 1,821,000 viewers at 10:45 p.m. ET.
• Viewership for FOX Saturday Baseball’s Opening Weekend broadcasts, a two-game schedule that featured New York Yankees at Houston Astros in most of the country, was up +14% from 2023 FOX MLB Opener with 2,527,000 viewers.
• ESPN’s first Sunday Night Baseball broadcast of the year between the St. Louis Cardinals at the Los Angeles Dodgers was up +17% in viewership from the 2023 Opening Sunday Night with 1,821,000 viewers, peaking with 2,360,000 viewers at 9:45 p.m. ET. Additionally, viewership in the P18-49 demo was also up +17% from last season’s Sunday Night Baseball season-opener.
• Viewership for MLB on FS1 was the best for any MLB regular season on the network since August 2021 with their opening weekend presentation of Atlanta Braves at Philadelphia Phillies.
• MLB Network Opening Weekend coverage featuring five games was the network’s best since 2021.

MLB.TV
• The Yankees vs. Astros game on Opening Day was the most-watched game ever on MLB.TV, surpassing the previous record of the Orioles vs. Red Sox on Opening Day last season.
o Seven of the top 25 most-watched games ever occurred over Opening Weekend.

• Fans watched the most baseball on MLB.TV in a four-day period ever, with over 436 million minutes viewed. This total marked a +6% increase when compared to the first four days of the 2023 season.
o Three of the top nine most-watched days ever occurred over Opening Weekend.

Digital Media
• MLB’s social media accounts set a new record for most followers gained (+125.9K) and engagements (19.8M) for an Opening Weekend in MLB history.
• The MLB App saw its most engaged four-day period in history with over 30 million visits to the MLB App through Opening Weekend

International Television
• The Seoul Series drew big ratings increases in Japan over previous MLB regular season games played in Asia/Japan. The two games averaged a 23.3% HH ratings (estimated viewership is 17.0 million). That audience more than doubled previous Japan Series to open the MLB season:
 2008 Japan Series Total: 10.3% HH ratings (est. 7.2M avg. viewers)
 2012 Japan Series Total: 11.3% HH ratings (est. 8.0M avg. viewers)
 2019 Japan Series Total: 10.5% HH ratings (est. 7.7M avg. viewers)

** Game 1 aired on NHK G, and Game 2 aired on TV Asahi and NHK BS1.

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