RESTON, VA – People are watching more online video than ever and AOL has climbed into the number two spot for video content, up from seventh in February, possibly due to the way comScore now measures viewers.

According to comScore’s Video Matrix, 174 million Internet users, up 4 million from February, in the U.S. watched online video in March, averaging 14.8 hours per viewer.

Google sites (YouTube) continued to lead with 143.2 million viewers, followed by AOL with 57 million. Yahoo sites were third with 56.4 million, and Microsoft sites fourth with 53.1 million.

Vevo was fifth (52.6 million) and Facebook sixth (48.8 million).

AOL, which has boosted video content on all its properties, also may have benefited from comScore’s switch to unified digital measurement.

AOL has also integrated HuffPost video following its purchase of the news aggregation site.

So, are you watching more online video? We’re impressed with Facebook’s rise as a video source. It’s what steers us to most of the videos we watch these days, although most are on YouTube.

What concerns us, though, is that all this online video viewing makes Internet service providers look for ways to charge based on bandwidth consumed. It’s already happening in Canada and we’re likely to see repeated attempts to do the same by providers in the United States.

Related Stories:

• Video ads reached more than half the U.S. population in July
• YouTube continues domination of online video, Vevo second
• Online video viewing hits new record
• Viewers spent way more hours watching video on Netflix than on YouTube
• Study says: online video use up 11 percent, Hulu climbs

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Tags: AOL, comScore, facebook, Google, Huffington Post, online video views March 2011, reports, Vevo, Yahoo, YouTube