The pulse compressor plays an important role in accelerators by enhancing the RF peak power. An S-band (2856 MHz) spherical cavity pulse compressor consisting of a special 3 dB coupler and a single spherical energy storage cavity has been developed in Institute of High Energy Physics. The special 3 dB coupler converts the TE 10 mode in rectangular waveguide to two polarization degenerated TE 11 modes in cylindrical waveguide. It is also a circular polarizer and its general scattering matrix is given for the first time. The magnitude and the phase difference of the two TE 11 modes are −3.016, −3.005 dB and 90.02 • in HFSS, while it is −3.01, −3.01 dB and 89.79 • in CST. The simulated S parameters show agreement with the general scattering matrix. The TE 114 mode with an unloaded Q factor of 190,000 has been chosen to resonate in the spherical cavity. An energy multiplication factor of 1.75 and a peak power gain of 5.75 were obtained for the whole pulse compressor, which agrees with the design requirements. A good pulse compression performance is also proved by the CST time-domain simulation. In addition, the scheme for tuning and detuning is designed and given in detail. Compared to the traditional SLED type, the spherical cavity pulse compressor uses only one spherical cavity to real-