The efficiency of the mucociliary clearance (MCC) process that removes noxious materials from airway surfaces depends on the balance between mucin secretion, airway surface liquid (ASL) volume, and ciliary beating. Effective mucin dispersion into ASL requires salt and water secretion onto the mucosal surface, but how mucin secretion rate is coordinated with ion and, ultimately, water transport rates is poorly understood. Several components of MCC, including electrolyte and water transport, are regulated by ASL nucleotides interacting with purinergic receptors. Using polarized monolayers of airway epithelial Calu-3 cells, we investigated whether mucin secretion was accompanied by nucleotide release. Electron microscopic analyses of Calu-3 cells identified sub-apical granules that resembled goblet cell mucin granules. Real-time confocal microscopic analyses revealed that sub-apical granules, labelled with FM 1-43 or quinacrine, were competent for Ca2+-regulated exocytosis. Granules containing MUC5AC were apically secreted via Ca2+-regulated exocytosis as demonstrated by combined immunolocalization and slot blot analyses. In addition, Calu-3 cells exhibited Ca2+-regulated apical release of ATP and UDP-glucose, a substrate of glycosylation reactions within the secretory pathway. Neither mucin secretion nor ATP release from Calu-3 cells were affected by activation or inhibition of CFTR. In SPOC1 cells, an airway goblet cell model, P2Y2 receptor-stimulated increase of cytosolic Ca2+ resulted in secretion of both mucins and nucleotides. Our data suggest that nucleotide release is a mechanism by which mucin-secreting goblet cells produce paracrine signals for mucin hydration within the ASL.