Types of Drones

1. Single Rotor Drone

Single rotor drones are very strong and look similar in structure and design to actual helicopters.

They have one big rotor like a big spinning wing and a small sized rotor on the tail for direction and stability.

There is also one wing behind which help takeoff from land, to stay or move forward.

Example: RC Helicopter

2. Multi Rotor Drone

The most popular type of drone used in remote sensing, surveillance, filmmaking, racing, photography, and aerial surveying is the multi-rotor drone.

They carry several rotors on their body and can be further classified based on the number of rotors in them.

There are tricopters (3 rotors), quadcopters (4 rotors), hexacopters (6 rotors) and octocopters (8 rotors).

Example: Octocopter with eight propellers.

3. Fixed Wing Drone

A fixed-wing drone is a drone designed to have one rigid wing and works like an airplane.

These drones are not able to stand stable in air because they are not too powerful to fight against gravitational force.

Fixed wing UAVs are well used in the military

Example: It was used during World War I, it was called the “Kettering Bug”.

4. Fixed Hybrid VTOL Drone

Hybrid fixed-wing/vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL)UAVs are drones that can operate in both vertical flight for takeoff and landing and horizontal flight once in the air.

They are hybrids between fixed-wing UAVs and rotary-wing UAVs, incorporating both fixed wings and propellers in their designs.

VTOL Stands For:

V for Vertical

T for Take

O for Off

L for Landing

Example: Heliplane Drone

5. Flappy Wings

It is designed to fly like a bird by flapping its wings.

Its wings not only beat up and down, but also twist at specific angles.

Example: Festo's Bird Drone