National Archaeological Museum (MANN)

The museum's schedule, valid to November 30, divides the galleries into three groups.

The rotation for Magna Graecia: on Monday and Friday it opens in the afternoon, on Wednesday and Saturday in the morning. The English and Italian versions of the schedule give slightly different afternoon times (2:30 to 7:30 p.m. in English, 2:10 to 7:10 p.m. in Italian), so aim for the middle of the window. If Magna Graecia matters to you, avoid Thursday and Sunday.

With the mosaics closed, build the visit around four galleries:

1. The Farnese sculptures, ground floor. The collection began with Alessandro Farnese, who became Pope Paul III in 1534, and reached Naples through Charles of Bourbon, who inherited it from his mother. This is where the colossal Farnese Hercules and the Farnese Bull stand.
2. The frescoes, first floor. The museum calls the collection a manual of Roman wall painting from the 1st century BC to the 1st century AD, from the Boscoreale villa megalographies to the House of Meleager and the House of the Dioscuri at Pompeii. Look for the fresco of the brawl in the amphitheatre of Pompeii.
3. The Temple of Isis. The first religious building excavated at Pompeii, in 1764. Its paintings are hung at the heights they had on the original walls.
4. The Villa dei Papiri, open 10 a.m. to 6:20 p.m. The bronzes from the Herculaneum villa where more than 1,800 charred papyrus scrolls were found, dug by tunnel in 1750 to 1764 through volcanic rock 27 meters deep.

Finish at the scale model of Pompeii, built at 1:100 in cork, wood and paper and first shown in 1879. It is the best preparation there is for a day at Pompeii or Herculaneum, since so much of what you see here was lifted from those sites.

The Battle of Issus mosaic from the House of the Faun measures 5.82 by 3.13 m and was found in 1831. It traveled from Pompeii to Naples in November 1844 on an ox-cart and hung on the wall of the mosaic rooms from 1916. The museum's restoration project found cracks, bulges and a sunken area caused by rusting iron and failing mortar.

In October 2023 the mosaic was taken down and turned horizontal, and a viewing window let visitors watch the work from the next room. A second phase, consolidating the original mortar and building a new support, began on July 3, 2024 and was scheduled to end in early 2025. We could not find an official 2026 statement on whether the mosaic is back on display. In practice the question is academic until November 30, 2026, because the entire Mosaic collection is closed. If seeing it is the reason for your trip, plan for December or later and check the museum's open-rooms page the week before you go.

• Full price €20. Valid for the permanent galleries and temporary exhibitions. Tickets cannot be changed, cancelled or refunded. The museum lists the online advance-sale fee as €0.
• €2 for citizens of EU and EEA states, Switzerland and Uruguay aged 18 to 25, until the day after the 25th birthday.
• Free for all visitors under 18 and visitors with disabilities.
• Free for everyone on the first Sunday of each month and on November 4, 2026. Free-day tickets cannot be booked; collect them at the desk on the day. On free days the Egyptian collection, Magna Graecia and the Secret Cabinet are closed for security.
• €10 with the Campania Artecard once the card's free entries are used up. Our page on whether the Artecard is worth it does that arithmetic.
• OPEN MANN annual card: €25 adult, €5 youth, €10 university student. It pays off on a second visit, and it adds priority access.

A MANN ticket also gets you 25% off at a list of partner sites, including Galleria Borbonica and the Catacombs of San Gennaro.

• Audio guide: €5, or €4 with OPEN MANN or the Artecard, rented at the ticket desk, in Italian, English, French, Spanish and German.
• Access: the western gate is the step-free entrance for wheelchairs and strollers. Lifts serve one wing each; on the first floor you must go back to the ground floor to change wings.
• Lockers: free and self-service, on the left at the entrance.
• Timing: last entry is 6:30 p.m. and staff start clearing the galleries at 7 p.m. The bookshop closes half an hour before the museum.

The museum is at the top of the Centro Storico. From the door it is roughly 900 m (0.6 miles) downhill to the Cappella Sansevero, which makes a museum morning and an old-town afternoon an easy pairing. Museo station is itself one of the Line 1 art stations.

Naples: National Archaeological Museum of Naples Guided Tour

Entry (€20 at the museum) is in the price, so the guide costs about €22. The museum is closed on Tuesdays. Not suitable for wheelchair users, per the listing.

2 hours

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