Transition-metal peroxos have been implicated as key intermediates in a variety of critical biological processes involving O2. Due to their highly reactive nature, very few metal-peroxos have been characterized. The dioxygen chemistry of manganese remains largely unexplored despite the proposed involvement of a binuclear Mn-peroxo, either as a precursor to O2, or derived from O2, in both photosynthetic H2O oxidation and DNA biosynthesis, arguably two of the most fundamental processes of life. Neither of these biological intermediates has been observed. Herein we describe the dioxygen chemistry of coordinatively unsaturated [MnII(SMe2N4(6-MeDPEN))] +(1), and the characterization of intermediates formed en route to a binuclear mono-oxo bridged Mn(III) product {[MnIII(SMe2N4(6-MeDPEN)]2-(μ-O)}2+ (2), the oxo atom of which is derived from 18O2. At low-temperatures, a dioxygen intermediate, [Mn(SMe2N4(6-MeDPEN))(O2)]+ (4), is observed (by stopped-flow) to rapidly and irreversibly form in this reaction (k1(−10 °C)= 3780±180M−1s−1, ΔH1‡ = 26.4±1.7 kJ mol−1, ΔS1‡ = − 75.6±6.8 J mol−1K−1), and then convert more slowly (k2(−10 °C)= 417±3.2 M−1s−1, ΔH2‡ = 47.1±1.4 kJ mol−1, ΔS2‡ = − 15.0±5.7 J mol−1K−1) to a species 3 with isotopically sensitive stretches at νo-o (Δ18O) = 819(47) cm−1, kO–O= 3.02 mdyn/Å, and νMn-O(Δ18O) = 611(25) cm−1 consistent with a peroxo. Intermediate 3 releases approximately 0.5 equiv of H2O2 per Mn ion upon protonation, and the rate of conversion of 4 to 3 is dependent on [Mn(II)] concentration, consistent with the formation of a binuclear Mn-peroxo. This was verified by X-ray crystallography, where the peroxo of {[MnIII(SMe2N4(6-Me-DPEN)]2(trans–μ–1,2–O2)}2+ (3) is shown to be bridging between two Mn(III) ions in an end-on trans-μ-1,2-fashion. This represents the first characterized example of a binuclear Mn(III)-peroxo, and a rare case in which more than one intermediate is observed en route to a binuclear μ–oxo bridged product derived from O2. Vibrational and metrical parameters for binuclear Mn-peroxo 3 are compared with those of related binuclear Fe- and Cu-peroxo compounds.