Recently, someone asked a good question.

How can I find the aerodynamic properties of an airfoil?

Here’s my quick suggestion:

Simple low-fidelity incompressible (camber line only, but works amazingly well):

• Thin airfoil theory (Anderson, Fundamentals of Aerodynamics, Chapter 4)
• Lesson 13 at https://charles-oneill.com/aem313/

Medium low fidelity incompressible (camber and thickness)

• Panel methods (Katz & Plotkin book is best…)
• Lesson 12 at https://charles-oneill.com/aem614/

Numerical incompressible with boundary layers

• XFOIL software (free MIT software. My students have coupled it with other solvers. Lesson 12 at https://charles-oneill.com/aem313/)

Expensive computational

• CFD (don’t unless you need a compressible viscous solution)