Vertical Takeoff and Landing (VTOL) aircraft are designed to take off, hover, and land vertically. They require significant amount of thrust specially during takeoff and landing phases to counteract the force of gravity. The ability to generate high thrust is a critical aspect of VTOL design. To generate the necessary thrust, VTOL aircraft require specialized propulsion systems such as ducted propellers. However, most of these aircraft continue to use general-purpose propulsion systems that leads to loss of thrust and efficiency. In this paper we discuss how we were able to achieve much higher thrust and efficiency gains by using electric ducted propellers. We will study the design considerations we made to make our propellers more efficient. Mechanical designs of the ducted propeller, the rotor, and other components are explained along with dimensions. The electrical subsystem including power, motor, controllers are also covered. We will also discuss the experimental setup we used to perform the tests. Experimental results were obtained and compared for our ducted propeller and general-purpose un-ducted propellers. Simulations were carried out using the CAD model of the propellers and results were compared with experimental data. We also present performance characteristics of our propellers under various mechanical and electrical conditions.