Two days is enough to fall for Naples and not enough to understand it. Here's how to spend them without regret.
The mistake is the shopping list. Twelve sights in two days means you've seen none of them — you've seen the queue outside each one. Better to give each day a shape and accept that you'll miss things.
Start at Piazza Bellini with a coffee, then walk into Via dei Tribunali. Don't rush: this is the main decumanus of the Greek city, and there are twenty-five centuries lying around on the pavement.
Stops: San Paolo Maggiore, with the two surviving columns of the Roman temple of the Dioscuri built into its façade. San Gregorio Armeno and its cloister. The Duomo and the chapel of the Treasure of San Gennaro.
Then drop down onto Spaccanapoli for the Sansevero Chapel — book ahead, entry is capped — and Santa Chiara with its majolica cloister.
Pick one guided visit, not two. Napoli Sotterranea from Via dei Tribunali, or San Lorenzo Maggiore with the Roman market beneath it, or the Bourbon Tunnel if you prefer the twentieth century — a royal escape route that became an air-raid shelter and then a car dump.
Each takes about ninety minutes and real attention. Two in one afternoon is one too many.
Pizza in the historic centre. Go at 7.30pm or after 10pm to miss the worst of the queue. Then Piazza Bellini or the side streets off the Tribunali, where people stand outside with a drink until late.
If you'd rather sit down and hear each other speak, move the evening to Chiaia.
The pedestrian seafront from Mergellina to Castel dell'Ovo: three kilometres with Vesuvius in front of you the whole way. Early, it's almost empty.
Castel dell'Ovo is free and its upper terraces give you the whole bay. Below it sits the Borgo Marinari, a tiny harbour with boats and restaurants a metre from the water.
Then Piazza del Plebiscito, the Galleria Umberto I, and a coffee at the Gambrinus if you want the historic stop.
Take the Centrale funicular up from Via Toledo. Four minutes and you're in the Vomero.
Castel Sant'Elmo for the 360-degree view, or the Certosa di San Martino for cloisters and the world's most important collection of Neapolitan nativity scenes. Not both, if you have a train.
Finish by walking down the Pedamentina: four hundred steps, twenty minutes, and the city opening up at every turn. It's the best way to say goodbye to it.
Pompeii, Vesuvius, the islands and the Amalfi Coast. Each is a full day, and squeezing one into a weekend means spending half your time in transit.
If Pompeii is the reason you're coming, invert the plan: one day Pompeii, one day Naples, and let the rest go.
Book the Sansevero Chapel as soon as you have dates. It's the one thing that genuinely sells out.
Check Sunday and Monday closures for museums and churches. In Naples they change more often than you'd expect.
This guide is written and maintained in Naples. The Italian version of the site has far more: hundreds of places, neighbourhood guides and long-form stories about the city. Read it in Italian.
