There is an urgent global need to grow a low carbon blue economy and for Australia to meet its international obligations. Mechanisms that allow for multiple use of ocean space are acknowledged as an important enabler for blue economy industry development and to reduce conflict in highly contested and confined sea spaces. Marine Spatial Planning is an important tool to facilitate multi-use of ocean space and integrate sectors. However, the degree that multi-use between and within sectors is currently operationalised through spatial planning is limited. We consider seven global case studies to assess the extent to which multi-use is operationalised in well-established marine planning frameworks through the lens of multi-use typologies. We use this information to understand where opportunities for multi-use are evident between sectors, where barriers to integration persist and where potential compatibility between sectors is being realised. Despite the strong advocacy of multi-use to deliver growth of sustainable blue economies, the uptake of multi-use is yet to be fully realised. Other strategies that support conflict resolution while growing the blue economy might be more important in the interim while opportunities for, and barriers to, multi-use are operationalised.