Five Days in Naples with Pompeii and Seasonal Capri

Keep Naples as your base, with separate days for Pompeii and seasonal Capri. The Sansevero Chapel, the National Archaeological Museum and Santa Chiara give the city days their anchors, while neighbourhood walks, waterfront pauses and dinners leave space between the major visits. These are five full sightseeing days after arrival, not a stay squeezed around flights.

Before your five days begin

Stay

Five full sightseeing days after arrival

Base

Centro Storico or Via Toledo, Naples

Written order

Wednesday start

Book first

Sansevero Chapel timed entry

Do not miss the Sansevero Chapel, Santa Chiara, the National Archaeological Museum (MANN) and Pompeii. Centro Storico puts the chapel within walking reach. From Napoli Centrale, use Metro Line 1 at Garibaldi for Università or Dante in the historic centre, or Toledo for Via Toledo. Molo Beverello, the passenger port, lies downhill from Via Toledo, and Municipio station also serves it.

Visit	Adult admission	Individual booking	Booking charge
Sansevero Chapel	€12	Mandatory	—
Santa Chiara	€7	Not required; ticket office	—
MANN	€20	Optional; recommended online	No extra charge
Pompeii Express	€20	Optional; dated entry slot	—
Gardens of Augustus	€2.50	Not required	—
Capodimonte	€15	Optional; recommended	€2 if reserved
Main admission subtotal	€76.50	Separate tickets	Excludes optional charges
Optional catacombs	€13	Mandatory guided reservation	—
Optional Pompeii+	€25	Includes suburban villas	—
Optional villa add-on	€8	With Express; card payment	—
Optional San Giacomo	€10	Optional	No mandatory fee

Pompeii Express covers the ancient city. For the Villa of the Mysteries, choose Pompeii+ instead, or buy the suburban-villas add-on by card at the Herculaneum Gate route entrance. Pompeii+ also includes Villa Diomedes, Villa Regina, Boscoreale’s Antiquarium and the shuttle. The villa is not a standalone ticket.

Carry walking shoes, water and sun protection. Naples dinners usually fall around 20:00–22:00, so the days retain an accommodation rest before their evening squares and meal areas. The Wednesday start avoids the regular museum closures in the written order.

Campania Artecard or separate tickets

Criterion	Separate tickets	Campania Artecard 7
Main admission cost	€76.50	€64.50 digital; €66.50 paperBest
MANN, Pompeii Express, Capodimonte	€55 combined	Three included admissions
Validity	Individual ticket conditions	7 calendar days from activation
Public transport	Not included	Not included

Artecard saves money if you retain all three covered main visits. The available pass costs €43 digitally or €45 on paper. First cultural-site entry activates it, and each validity day ends at midnight. It allows five admissions to five different sites, then discounted admission from the sixth.

The comparison includes the chapel, cloister and gardens as separate purchases. Artecard’s Pompeii entitlement excludes the suburban villas: its villa supplement is €8. Holders can use Piazza Esedra’s dedicated entrance. Dropping Capodimonte leaves €40 of covered separate admissions, making separate tickets cheaper.

Day 1: The historic centre and Via Toledo

The Veiled Christ, Spaccanapoli and Santa Chiara’s tiled cloister make a day of close-looking and browsing, ending with Piazza Dante and Via dei Tribunali dinner. On Tuesday, move this whole day: Sansevero Chapel is closed.

Sansevero Chapel rewards attention to the marble veil and sculpted folds of the Veiled Christ. Choose your dated appointment before arranging the rest of the morning.

Spaccanapoli follows the ancient city’s east–west line through churches, palaces and shops. The optional Via San Gregorio Armeno detour adds handmade nativity scenes, from terracotta figures to humorous contemporary characters. Gesù Nuovo’s diamond-patterned façade makes its optional church stop distinctive.

At lunch on Via San Biagio dei Librai, pizza offers a soft-centred, raised-rim option, while pizza fritta is fried filled dough, often with ricotta. A sfogliatella, a shell-shaped pastry usually filled with sweet ricotta and semolina, suits a café pause.

Santa Chiara’s benches and columns carry colourful majolica scenes of everyday life. Take time to look beyond the garden paths to the decoration.

Via Toledo brings largely pedestrian shopping, and Galleria Umberto I adds a glass-and-iron roof overhead. The optional Maradona mural takes you into the Spanish Quarter above Toledo. Shorten outdoor browsing in rain, then rest before Piazza Dante’s broad evening square and the pizzerias along Via dei Tribunali.

Day 2: MANN and Rione Sanità

After the historic-centre day, MANN’s Farnese Bull and Pompeian mosaics lead into Rione Sanità’s palace streets, with a relaxed Piazza Bellini evening before Via Foria dinner. Move this day off Tuesday, MANN’s regular closure. When Tuesday is a public holiday, it opens and closes on Wednesday instead.

MANN connects tomorrow’s ruins with their surviving art. Start with the monumental Farnese Bull, then the Alexander Mosaic and mosaics from the House of the Faun: their figures and fine detail give domestic interiors a subject beyond broken walls.

Santa Maria della Sanità’s dome marks the optional church stop before lunch in Piazza Sanità. The optional Catacombs of San Gennaro add early Christian burial spaces on a guided visit. Keep the reserved visit before the neighbourhood walk.

In Rione Sanità, look for the ornate fronts, balconies and grand portals of Palazzo dello Spagnolo and Palazzo Sanfelice. Expect uneven paving, slopes, steps and streets shared with traffic. In rain, shorten this browsing rather than the museum morning.

After resting at your accommodation, Piazza Bellini offers an evening pause beside exposed ancient Greek walls. Continue to Via Foria, the broad street along the northern side of the historic centre, for dinner.

Day 3: Pompeii by train

After MANN, Pompeii’s Forum and house-lined streets turn the ancient city into a walkable subject, followed by town lunch and a Via Toledo evening. Take the EAV Napoli–Pompei–Sorrento train from Napoli Piazza Garibaldi to Pompei Scavi–Villa dei Misteri.

Use the Forum to understand how Pompeii’s public spaces connect to streets and houses. Concentrate on that relationship rather than every building. Rough paving, steps and limited shade make sturdy shoes, water and sun protection important.

The optional Antiquarium adds archaeological displays included in park admission. The Villa of the Mysteries adds painted rooms but needs the villa entitlement described in the ticket section. Leave through Piazza Anfiteatro for lunch in Piazza Bartolo Longo. The optional sanctuary across the square is modern Pompeii’s pilgrimage landmark.

Return from Pompei Scavi to Naples. The optional Naples Cathedral main-church visit is free without individual reservation, but sightseeing stops during services. Skip it during worship, retaining your accommodation rest. Piazza del Gesù Nuovo brings you back to the historic centre before dinner. Leave Vesuvius for another day.

Day 4: Capri town and the gardens

After Pompeii, Capri’s lanes, Tragara’s Faraglioni view and the Gardens of Augustus make a slower island day, returning for Spanish Quarter dinner. Set off from Molo Beverello. On Mondays, omit the closed Charterhouse of San Giacomo.

This ferry plan applies from 1 April to 3 November 2026, using NLG’s seasonal crossings. Outside that period, favour the city days.

From Marina Grande, ascend on foot or take the funicular directly to Capri’s Piazzetta. Buses also serve town. Its narrow pedestrian lanes bring cafés and boutiques together. Optional Tragara offers a public view of the Faraglioni sea stacks, with morning light suiting the pause.

After lunch on Via Roma, the Gardens of Augustus reward their visit with coastal outlooks and a chance to linger over the island’s southern views.

The optional Charterhouse of San Giacomo adds former monastic spaces. Omit either detour for more town or harbour time, retaining your return crossing. Descend to Marina Grande, then rest in Naples before Piazza Municipio’s Castel Nuovo view and dinner above Via Toledo.

Day 5: Capodimonte and the waterfront

After Capri, Capodimonte’s paintings and Via Partenope’s Castel dell’Ovo views give the last day an art-to-seafront rhythm, ending with Mergellina dinner. Move the museum morning off Wednesday, its weekly closure.

Capodimonte brings the Farnese painting collection into a palace setting. Focus on the paintings rather than expecting every collection to be accessible. Individual reservation is optional but useful for avoiding queues.

The optional Royal Wood adds a grounds walk before Via Miano lunch. Take the bus towards Piazza del Plebiscito, where the Royal Palace faces the curved church colonnade. Via Partenope opens views of Castel dell’Ovo across the water, and Borgo Marinari adds the small harbour beneath it.

After your accommodation rest, optional Villa Comunale leads into Via Caracciolo’s seafront pause. Late-day light rewards the waterfront, but in winter, move the outdoor stretch earlier. Rain favours shorter park and seafront browsing. At Mergellina dinner, consider spaghetti with clams or grilled fish, alongside simpler tomato-based pasta.

Late arrivals and shorter stays

Two days suit a city-only stay, while five full days allow both excursions without sacrificing Naples. For two days in Naples, retain the historic-centre anchors and MANN, with a waterfront evening rather than an island crossing.

For a reduced stay with an excursion, keep Pompeii and cut optional workshops, catacombs, villa and park detours first. Capri is the seasonal, weather-sensitive full-day commitment to remove next.

A late first morning moves the chapel appointment to another compatible city day, rather than compressing every stop. An early departure removes the final evening. Move Capodimonte to an available city morning if you still want its collections.

Sources & fact-checking

Checks against the sources below cover: closures, fares and charges, and services. Route times and distances were calculated from geolocated stops.

• Sansevero Chapel Museum — closures
• Museo Cappella Sansevero — fares and charges
• Sansevero Chapel Museum — service
• Complesso Monumentale di Santa Chiara — fares and charges
• Complesso Monumentale di Santa Chiara — service
• Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli — closures
• Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (MANN) — service
• Catacombs of Naples (Catacombe di Napoli) — service
• La Paranza social cooperative — fares and charges
• Archaeological Park of Pompeii — fares and charges
• Archaeological Park of Pompeii — service
• Ente Autonomo Volturno (EAV) — service
• Parish of St. Mary of the Assumption in Cathedral — service
• Fondazione Napoli C’entro — service
• NLG — service
• NLG S.p.a. — service
• Ferry operators — service
• ATC srl (Azienda Trasporti Campana) — service
• Agenzia Regionale Campania Turismo; Capri Cultura e Turismo (group online-ticketing rule) — fares and charges
• Italian Ministry of Culture — closures
• Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte — closures
• Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte — fares and charges
• Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte — service
• Campania Artecard 7
• Canova & l’Antico at MANN – Artecard
• Campania Artecard; Archaeological Park of Pompeii — service