Things to do in Naples

Buried under volcanic ash by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, Pompeii preserves an entire Roman city caught in mid-life. Visitors walk its paved streets past the forum, the amphitheatre, temples, bath houses and frescoed villas, while the haunting plaster casts of victims recall the day the city died. Bakeries, taverns and painted election slogans still line the walls, and the whole site rewards a full day on foot.

Location: Pompei, about 25 km southeast of Naples

Heritage: UNESCO World Heritage Site

Access: Ticketed; reached by the Circumvesuviana railway

The grandest square in Naples sweeps between the curved colonnade of the San Francesco di Paola church and the long facade of the Royal Palace. Laid out in its present neoclassical form in the early 19th century, the vast open space hosts concerts and public festivals and offers a rare uncluttered view in the dense old city. For much of the year it doubles as a stage, a market and a meeting point, and crossing it on foot costs nothing at any hour.

Style: Neoclassical, completed 1846

Location: Between the Royal Palace and San Francesco di Paola, historic centre

Access: Free public square

The only active volcano on mainland Europe rises over the Bay of Naples, the same cone that destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum in 79 AD. A marked trail climbs the upper slopes to a viewpoint on the rim of the smoking crater, where guides explain the eruptions and the reach of the ash, with sweeping views over the bay and the city far below. Access is by timed ticket, which sells out in high season and depends entirely on the weather.

Location: Vesuvius National Park, above Ercolano

Access: Timed entry, booked online in advance; weather permitting · Tickets and tours

This soaring arcade of glass, iron and marble was raised at the end of the 19th century as part of the rebuilding of Naples after a cholera epidemic. Four grand wings meet under a high domed roof, lined with cafes, shops and a patterned marble floor set with the signs of the zodiac. It faces the Teatro di San Carlo and links busy Via Toledo with the theatre district, and it is free to walk through and shelter in all day long.

Architect: Emanuele Rocco

Style: Stile umbertino, opened 1890

Location: Via Toledo, opposite the Teatro di San Carlo

Access: Free, open through the day

Also known as the Maschio Angioino, this five-towered fortress by the port has guarded Naples since the Angevin kings raised it in the late 13th century. A gleaming white marble triumphal arch, added for Alfonso of Aragon, frames the entrance between two dark stone towers. Inside, the Civic Museum, the frescoed Palatine Chapel and the vast vaulted Barons' Hall are open to visitors, and the ramparts look out over the harbour and the bay beyond.

Architect: Pierre d'Angicourt

Style: Gothic, begun 1282

Location: Piazza Municipio

Access: Ticketed; closed Tuesdays

Smaller and richer than Pompeii, Herculaneum was buried by the same eruption but sealed under superheated mud that preserved wooden beams, staircases, furniture and even loaves of bread. The compact excavation sits in a pit below the modern town of Ercolano, its houses still standing two storeys high with mosaics, marble and painted walls intact. It rewards a slower, closer look than its more famous neighbour, and a visit takes roughly half a day.

Location: Ercolano, about 8 km southeast of Naples

Heritage: UNESCO World Heritage Site

Access: Ticketed

The Franciscan complex of Santa Chiara pairs a severe Gothic basilica, holding the tombs of the Angevin kings, with one of the most photographed courtyards in the city. Its cloister is lined with octagonal columns and long benches sheathed in hand-painted 18th-century majolica tiles showing vines, landscapes and lively country scenes. Rebuilt after wartime bombing, the basilica keeps its stripped-back medieval lines, and a small museum traces the story of the whole monastic complex.

Style: Gothic, 14th century

Location: Via Santa Chiara, off Spaccanapoli

Access: Basilica free; majolica cloister and museum ticketed

This small Baroque chapel holds one of the most astonishing sculptures in Italy, the Veiled Christ, carved from a single block of marble with a shroud so fine it looks like real cloth laid over the body. Around it stand allegorical statues of unusual virtuosity, and in the crypt below wait the unsettling Anatomical Machines assembled by the chapel's alchemist prince. The interior is tiny and hugely popular, so entry runs on strict timed slots.

Location: Via Francesco de Sanctis, historic centre

Access: Timed entry, advance booking essential · Tickets and tours

Forty metres below the busy streets lies a second Naples, a network of tunnels and cisterns cut into the soft volcanic tuff over more than two thousand years. Greek quarries became Roman aqueducts and later wartime air-raid shelters, and guided tours lead down long narrow stairs and along candle-lit passages, in places crossing water or squeezing through slots barely shoulder-wide before opening onto a hidden Greco-Roman theatre reached through a private house.

Location: Piazza San Gaetano 68, historic centre

Access: Ticketed guided tour

The largest royal palace in the world by volume, the Reggia di Caserta was built for the Bourbon kings as a southern rival to Versailles. Its twelve hundred rooms open off a monumental staircase into gilded state apartments, while behind the palace a three-kilometre park unrolls with fountains, cascades and sculpted pools, ending at a waterfall and a landscaped English garden. Days spent here fill quickly, and it stands well outside the city.

Architect: Luigi Vanvitelli

Style: Baroque, 1752 to 1774

Location: Caserta, about 28 km north of Naples

Access: Ticketed · Tickets and tours

Facing Piazza del Plebiscito, the 17th-century Palazzo Reale was the seat of the Spanish viceroys and later the Bourbon court. Statues of eight kings of Naples stand in niches across its long red-and-grey facade. Inside, a monumental honour staircase leads up to the royal apartments, the court theatre and the frescoed halls of the National Library, hung with tapestries, paintings, gilded furniture and porcelain that together record three centuries of royal life in the city.

Architect: Domenico Fontana

Style: Renaissance and Baroque

Location: Piazza del Plebiscito

Access: Ticketed

One of the great archaeological museums of the world, MANN holds the finest finds from Pompeii and Herculaneum alongside the Farnese collection of monumental Roman sculpture. Its galleries run from colossal marbles and dazzling floor mosaics to everyday glassware, silver and the vivid frescoes lifted whole from buried villas. The separate Secret Cabinet gathers the erotic art once judged too explicit for public view, and a full visit easily takes several hours.

Location: Piazza Museo, near Via Toledo

Access: Ticketed; closed Tuesdays

The city's Gothic cathedral is the home of San Gennaro, patron saint of Naples, whose dried blood is said to liquefy on feast days before huge and anxious crowds. Behind the 19th-century facade rise a soaring nave, the richly frescoed Royal Chapel of the Treasure of San Gennaro, and the early Christian Baptistery of San Giovanni in Fonte with its fourth-century mosaics, the oldest in the Western world. The nave is open on a donation.

Style: Gothic, begun 1272

Location: Via Duomo, historic centre

Access: Nave free by donation; Treasury museum ticketed