Naples International Airport to Caserta
About 35 km north; the cheapest route is a train from Napoli Centrale after the €5 Alibus, and a taxi runs €70–90.
The Bourbon royal palace north of Naples — twelve hundred rooms, a staircase built to intimidate, and a formal park running three kilometres uphill to a waterfall with an English garden beside it.
Every way to get there
Our verdict: for Caserta, a private transfer is the easiest door-to-door option (from €75).
What it costs for your group
The bus is charged per person, while a taxi or private transfer is one price for the whole car — so the more of you there are, the better door-to-door value looks.
| Group | Private transfer | Best value |
|---|---|---|
| Solo · 1 traveller | €75 | Private transfer |
| Couple · 2 travellers | €75 | Private transfer |
| Family of 4 · 4 travellers | €75 | Private transfer |
Which option should you choose?
| If your priority is… | Our pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Lowest price | Cheapest fare | From €8, though slower with a change in the city. |
| Speed & comfort | Private transfer | Door-to-door, fixed price, a driver waiting for you. |
| A group of 3–4 | Transfer or taxi | One flat fare splits cheaper than several bus tickets. |
| A late-night arrival | Transfer or taxi | Both run 24/7 when buses and the tram have stopped. |
By transport mode
Train
The best-placed station in Italy for a monument: you walk out of it and the palace facade is in front of you. Around ten euros in total and the standard way to visit.
Where to catch it: Alibus to Napoli Centrale, then a regional train to Caserta — the station sits directly opposite the palace gates.
Best for budget travellers near a stationTaxi
Only makes sense if you are staying in Caserta rather than day-tripping, since the train drops you at the entrance and a taxi cannot do better than that.
Where to catch it: Forty-five minutes north on the motorway; check whether the fixed-fare list covers Caserta before agreeing.
Best for small groups in a hurryCar rental
Worth it if you are combining Caserta with the Roman amphitheatre at Santa Maria Capua Vetere or the Bourbon silk works at San Leucio, neither of which is on a useful bus route.
Where to catch it: Straightforward motorway run with paid parking near the palace.
Best for travellers who want to explorePrivate transfer
For a palace visit the train is better in every respect. For an onward journey north towards Benevento or the Matese mountains, a car of some kind is the only option.
Where to catch it: Mainly booked by people heading north on business — Caserta has a substantial industrial hinterland that visitors never see.
Best for families, groups & late arrivalsCaserta & Naples in photos
Buying tickets in Naples
Naples has no airport rail link and does not need one: the Alibus shuttle leaves from directly outside arrivals, costs €5, and reaches Piazza Garibaldi (Napoli Centrale) in 20–30 minutes before continuing to Piazza Municipio by the port in 35–40. The detail most arrivals miss is that the ticket is integrated and valid for 90 minutes across other urban services — so if your hotel needs a metro or funicular leg afterwards, the same €5 covers it. Buy from the machine, the ANM app or on board, and validate. For onward journeys, the Curreri coach runs from the same area down the peninsula to Sorrento, and the Circumvesuviana commuter railway from the lower level of Napoli Centrale serves Pompeii and the coast cheaply — get off at Pompei Scavi for the ruins, not plain Pompei, which is a different line and a 20-minute walk away.
Taxi scams & safety in Naples
Naples does something no other airport in this guide does: the city publishes binding fixed taxi fares with every supplement already inside the number — airport pickup, night, holiday, luggage and radio booking included. €21 to Napoli Centrale, €24 to Piazza Municipio, the port and the ZTL historic centre, €125 to Sorrento, €145 Positano, €155 Amalfi, €160 Ravello, one way per vehicle. Say "tariffa predeterminata" and name the destination as you get in, and the meter should stay off; motorway tolls and a minivan supplement are the normal exceptions. If a driver starts the meter for a listed destination, repeating the phrase is the correct response and an entirely routine one. Use the official rank rather than an approach inside the terminal. Do not hire a car for a Naples city stay — the centro storico is a camera-enforced restricted zone and parking is genuinely hard; hire later for Pompeii or the coast instead.
Getting from NAP to Caserta
Caserta has the best-placed railway station of any major monument in Italy. You walk out of it and the palace facade is directly in front of you, across a square. That single fact settles the transport question: take the train, not a taxi, and do not hire a car unless you are going somewhere else afterwards.
The route, in two legs
Alibus from the airport to Napoli Centrale for €5, then a regional train north to Caserta. Trains run every thirty to sixty minutes and take around forty. Total cost about ten euros, total time about eighty minutes. Buy the train ticket at the machine and validate it before boarding — the regional network enforces this and the fine is real.
What you are actually visiting
The Reggia was built by the Bourbon kings of Naples in the 1750s as a deliberate answer to Versailles, and it is larger. Twelve hundred rooms. A staircase designed to make ambassadors feel small, which it still does. The state apartments run in a sequence of increasingly ornate rooms to the throne room, and there is a court theatre that is opened for limited visits.
The park is the underestimated half
Three kilometres of formal gardens running uphill from the palace, along a spine of fountains and pools, to a waterfall at the top with a sculptural group of Diana and Actaeon at its base. It is a long walk — there is a shuttle bus and bicycle hire for good reason — and the perspective back down towards the palace at the end of it is the point of the whole design.
The English Garden
Off to one side near the top, and quite different: a deliberately informal landscape commissioned by Maria Carolina in the 1780s, with a false ruin, a botanical collection and water running through it. It closes earlier than the main park in some seasons, so check on arrival if you want to see it — most day visitors run out of time and miss it entirely.
When a car makes sense
If you are combining Caserta with things a train cannot reach. The Roman amphitheatre at Santa Maria Capua Vetere is the second largest in Italy after the Colosseum and receives a fraction of the visitors. San Leucio, just up the hill, was a Bourbon silk manufacturing settlement built as a planned community, and the machinery survives. Neither is on a useful bus route.
The practical shape of a day
Allow three hours minimum for the palace and park together, more if you walk the full length rather than taking the shuttle. There is a café at the top of the fountain axis. The palace closes on Tuesdays, which catches people out, and the last admission is well before closing time. Coming directly from the airport with luggage is awkward — there is no left-luggage facility at the palace.
Staying rather than day-tripping
Caserta is an ordinary provincial city and its hotels are priced accordingly, which makes it a reasonable base if Naples prices are unappealing and you have business in the north of the region. From here the mainline runs to Rome in an hour and back to Naples in forty minutes, and the Matese mountains are within reach for anyone wanting a day away from the coast.
Tickets and what they include
The palace and the park are sold separately as well as together, and the combined ticket is the one worth having — a great many visitors buy only the apartments, walk out into the gardens expecting to continue, and find they cannot. Book online in high season. The shuttle bus up the fountain axis and the bicycle hire are both charged on top and neither can be reserved in advance.
Filming, and why the palace looks familiar
The state apartments and the staircase have stood in for the imperial palace in two Star Wars films and for the Vatican in Mission: Impossible III, among a long list. It is worth knowing because it explains the occasional closed wing — the Reggia takes production bookings and sections come out of public access for days at a time, usually announced only on the day.
