A 2-D compact 8-element UWB diversity antenna of dimension 28 mm × 28 mm each, is proposed to operate from (4.1–24) GHz with 141.63% IBW for multi-service-multi-mode (MS2M) applications. With self-similar antennas, the antenna design embodiment is constructed by asserting cross-coupled inter-connect bridge substrates to accomodate eight radiating elements in a compact footprint. This configuration results in good isolation between non overlapped antenna clusters, the ortho-centric antenna arrangement asserts pattern diversity and avoids the dependancy of additional decoupling network. The performance metrics consists of isolation coefficient of >20 dB at all ports, realized gain varies from (4.5–8.1) dBi and ECC from far-field magnitude < 0.08, which makes it suitable for UWB diversity applications. To validate the multi-port antenna performance, a full-wave simulation PTFE shield enclousure with volume of 40 mm × 40 mm × 40 mm has been demonstrated, which shows good results in correlation to EM-simulation. With good performance attributes in the shield enclousure, the multi-port antenna can be exported to a fully fledged plastic jacketed cage for real-time environment. Finally, a prototype antenna is fabricated and measured with good agreements to validate the overall RF performances.