Protein O-mannosylation is found in yeast and metazoans, and a family of conserved orthologous protein O-mannosyltransferases is believed to initiate this important post-translational modification. We recently discovered that the cadherin superfamily carries O-linked mannose (O-Man) glycans at highly conserved residues in specific extracellular cadherin domains, and it was suggested that the function of E-cadherin was dependent on the O-Man glycans. Deficiencies in enzymes catalyzing O-Man biosynthesis, including the two human protein O-mannosyltransferases, POMT1 and POMT2, underlie a subgroup of congenital muscular dystrophies designated ␣-dystroglycanopathies, because deficient O-Man glycosylation of ␣-dystroglycan disrupts laminin interaction with ␣-dystroglycan and the extracellular matrix. To explore the functions of O-Man glycans on cadherins and protocadherins, we used a combinatorial gene-editing strategy in multiple cell lines to evaluate the role of the two POMTs initiating O-Man glycosylation and the major enzyme elongating O-Man glycans, the protein O-mannose -1,2-N-acetylglucosaminyltransferase, POMGnT1. Surprisingly, O-mannosylation of cadherins and protocadherins does not require POMT1 and/or POMT2 in contrast to ␣-dystroglycan, and moreover, the O-Man glycans on cadherins are not elongated. Thus, the classical and evolutionarily conserved POMT O-mannosylation pathway is essentially dedicated to ␣-dystroglycan and a few other proteins, whereas a novel O-mannosylation process in mammalian cells is predicted to serve the large cadherin superfamily and other proteins.Protein O-glycosylation of the O-mannose type was originally thought to be found only in yeast and fungi, but studies over the last 30 years have identified O-Man 2 glycans and specific glycoproteins carrying O-Man glycans in human and rodents (1-9). The basement membrane glycoprotein ␣-dystroglycan (␣-DG) was for some time the only well characterized O-mannosylated protein known in mammals despite evidence that O-Man glycans constitute a major part of the total O-glycans in the brain (1,2,8,9). O-Mannosylation of ␣-DG is essential for assembly and function of the dystrophin-glycoprotein complex that links the cytoskeleton with the extracellular matrix, and deficiencies in all of the enzymes involved in the O-Man glycosylation underlie a subgroup of congenital muscular dystrophies (10 -12). More recently, the human O-Man glycoproteome was characterized, and it was found that the large superfamily of cadherins (cdhs) and protocadherins (pcdhs) are also decorated with ␣-linked O-Man glycans on extracellular cadherin (EC) domains. The attachment sites of these O-Man glycans appear to be highly conserved throughout evolution (13,14); moreover, O-mannosylation of E-cadherin was suggested to be crucial for E-cadherin-mediated cell adhesion (15,16).O-Man glycosylation in metazoans is initiated in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) by transfer of mannose from dolichol monophosphate-activated mannose to serine and threonine by the POMT1 and POMT2 p...