The phase-shifting technique is applied to the circular harmonic expansion-based joint transform correlator. Computer simulation has shown that the light efficiency and the discrimination capability are greatly enhanced, and the full rotation invariance is preserved after the phase-shifting technique has been used. A rotation-invariant optical pattern recognition with high discrimination capability and high light efficiency is obtained. The influence of the additive noise on the performance of the correlator is also investigated. However, the anti-noise capability of this kind of correlator still needs improving.