We investigated static and dynamic characteristics of an externally pressurized porous annular thrust gas bearing, which has a thin restricted surface layer, by numerical analysis and experiment. In the analysis, it is assumed that the fluid flow obeys Darcy's law in the porous material, restricted with Darcy's restrictor or orifice restrictor in the surface layer, and is governed by the conventional Reynolds equation in the bearing clearance. We also carried out an experimental investigation on static and dynamic characteristics of the porous annular thrust gas bearing. As a result, it is found that the theoretical results calculated using the Darcy model in the restricted surface layer agree with the experimental results better than the results calculated using the orifice restrictor model.