The spherical hinge used in the horizontal rotation construction bridge has two forms: steel spherical hinge and concrete spherical hinge. Through the analysis of its structure and force characteristics, this paper believes that the failure mode of the control spherical hinge design is the lateral tension failure under local pressure. , And then put forward the design theory of the spherical hinge with the effective supporting radius as the control index, and unified the design method and process of the steel spherical hinge and the concrete spherical hinge. Through theoretical analysis and calculation deduction of the respective forces of steel and concrete spherical hinges, an accurate calculation formula for the effective support radius is given, which is used to guide the formulation of the geometric dimensions of the spherical hinge and the value of related parameters. Finally, the method in this paper is applied to actual engineering, and the data is in good agreement, which proves that the method in this paper is reasonable and reliable, and has strong guiding significance.