We have been developing a magnetic levitating device with two-dimensional movement, namely a ’levitating X-Y transporter’. For a real design of the levitating X-Y transporter, it is necessary to clarify the levitation characteristics, such as lift, levitation height and stability against mechanical disturbances. In this paper, we examine the lift and the restoring force experimentally and newly developed a simulation code based on the three-dimensional hybrid finite and boundary element method to analyze the dynamic electromagnetic behaviors of YBCO bulk. We investigated the suitable permanent-magnet arrangement to enhance the levitation characteristics through experiments and numerical simulation. And we also performed the design of a levitating transporter which can levitate a load of 200kg with a gap of 16mm.