Diffraction from a fixed sphere is treated as an initial value problem rather than as a boundary value problem. By requiring only boundedness of the diffracted wave potential rather than the stronger Sommerfeld radiation condition, it is shown via use of the Laplace transform and complete inversion integral that the diffracted wave potential consists of the usual steady‐state term plus transient terms. The magnitude of the transient terms are governed by β =kawhereais the radius of the sphere andkis the wave number; however, the rate of decay is governed by the dimensionless decay parameter ωt. Both Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions are discussed in detail. Finally, the transient force on the sphere is computed in the Neumann case and the behavior examined for the long‐wave (β≪1) and short‐wave (β≫1) approximations.