Guided transport has higher transport capacity and energy efficiency in operation than other modes of transport, so there has been fast development of guided transport all over the world in the past decades. Although rail transport is the most successful guided transport system, there are still some limitations to the further development of rail transport, e.g. long travel time for long-distance travel, noise and vibration in urban areas, and rail-wheel wear and adhesion. In response, maglev and hyperloop systems which do not rely on the rails and wheels have been proposed and developed. 

In maglev and hyperloop systems the vehicles are levitated and propelled from the guideway by magnetic forces. There is no direct physical contact between the moving train and the guideway during operation. To achieve very high-speed operation, hyperloop systems are supposed to run inside low-pressurized tubes to reduce aerodynamic drag. In the world, there are many different types of technology developed to realize maglev and hyperloop systems. However, the technology of maglev and hyperloop systems is relatively new and still under development. Now there are only five low-speed maglev systems and one high-speed maglev system in commercial operation in the world. 

The maglev and hyperloop systems have different features compared to the well-developed rail transport, so it is needed to look into their core technology and follow their latest development for future development in the transport sector. In response, this work gives an overview of the maglev and hyperloop systems with respect to their history, technology and applications in the world. This work summarizes the development history of different maglev and hyperloop systems, explain the core technology used in hyperloop systems and three types of maglev systems, and describe the applications of six commercial maglev systems. This work also compares the features of different systems based on statistics. In the end, some conclusions are drawn and future work plans are sketched.