Magnetic levitation (or maglev) technology uses magnets to suspend a vehicle above the track. Magnets in the track repel magnets in the vehicle, forcing them apart. Maglev is one of the few alternatives to wheels - the traditional way to make a vehicle easy to push. Because SkyTran cars are small, earlier maglev designs that required superconductor magnets wouldn't work. Instead, it uses a maglev technology developed in the US "star wars" missile defense research called Inductrack. Inductrack is "passive maglev" which means that it requires no computer control and no direct energy input. Instead the current it requires is generated by the motion of an array of powerful permanent magnets over conductive coils in the track.

Inductrack was developed, researched, and tested at the US Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories and developed further for transportation applications by General Atomics and other companies. Inductrack does not need superconductors or complex computer controls. In fact, it does not need to be directly powered at all. The kinetic energy of a moving vehicle provides the repulsive force that produces levitation. The guideway's core is a series of un-powered conductive coils (like the windings of an electric motor) through which current is generated as the vehicle's permanent magnets move over them. This current creates a magnetic field that repels the magnets in the vehicle. This is much more efficient than the aluminum trough that older repulsive maglev systems use, and doesn't require the complicated active control circuits that keep conventional maglev systems from collapsing. Neodymium permanent magnets can support 50 times their weight on Inductrack. So a 200 pound basic SkyTran car with 500 pounds of passengers and/or freight needs 700/50 = 14 pounds of magnets.

Like most maglev, Inductrack actually becomes more efficient as the vehicle's speed increases. At 100 MPH, a vehicle's magnetic resistance is better than the rolling resistance of the best hand-sewn racing bicycle tires. More important, because maglev has no moving parts, the tracks and vehicles won't wear out or require frequent maintenance like conventional steel or rubber wheels would. However, the most important reason to use maglev rather than wheels is to support many on- and off-ramps in a dense network of high-speed personal vehicles. If SkyTran vehicles had wheels like a train, a mechanical switch couldn't safely switch one vehicle off the guideway and then return to the straight-ahead position for a vehicle following at the one-second headway that's very safe on maglev SkyTran.

Using maglev, SkyTran gives a smoother, more efficient, more reliable trip.