Ireland Itinerary Without a Car

Have you considered a guided tour? You'd see so much more of Ireland since you're without wheels. I don't find being a slave to a bus or train schedule to be very efficient in a place like this.
We just returned from Ireland in May and spent most of our week down on the Ring of Kerry at a B&B. Pretty quiet country in the Spring.

With 2 weeks and without a car I would seriously consider a guided tour rather than doing it on my own by public transportation. I don't know what your budget is but check out some of tours from CIE Tours.

As others have said a guided tour is your best best. Ie.
There are many tour co that are quite gd. Besides Rick Steves tours consider IE tours or Gate one.
Quite affordable ck them out.

I agree with the others--if you really want cover so much territory in 7 nights, you should think about a tour. It would be very difficult to cover even half your destinations by public transport. You have to account for checking in to and out of accommodations, finding the bus or train, getting to the next accommodation, coming upon the places you want to linger, etc. A tour will have all that arranged for you. If, on the other hand, you want to travel solo, cut way back on your destinations. That's not a bad thing in Ireland. Plan 1, 2, or maybe 3 things a day, but let whatever happens, happen. Spend time in a pub chatting with people, but don't worry about checking everything off a pre-arranged to-do list.

I’m not huge on guided tours, but am looking into them to see if anything fits. If I went about it on my own for two weeks, are there cities that you would consider leaving out?

I researched similar trip as yours minus Belfast and Cork by public transport a few months ago in Trip Advisor. They recommended join local tours. Preferable transport mode of course is car. But we can get to Cork, Killarney, Galway and Belfast by combination of bus, train, and local tours.

As I previously said, we were in Ireland for a week this Spring.
Ireland is beautiful and we loved the people. But outside of the pubs of the big cities, we found Ireland pretty quiet. Satellite television essentially did away with the pubs and a way of life for many Irish.
While we are retired, we just found the country a little boring. A guided tour could take you to places efficiently that we as individual travelers probably missed. I'd hate to think what it would be without a car for transportation.

This is far to much to accomplish in so little time using public transit. Have you allowed time to travel from town to town? It takes over four hours to get from Dublin to Killarney by train, and from Killarney to Galway is even longer. This will eat up a chunk of your time, and you will not always be able to join the day tours you want to do as you won't get to your destination before they have left for the day. I travelled Ireland by public transit for three weeks, mostly by train, and I spent four days in each of Dublin, Killarney, Galway and Belfast with some other shorter stops thrown in to break up longer journeys. I made use of many guided day tours because local transit often doesn't get you to the places you want to see, or if it does it takes quite a bit longer so you aren't able to see as much. The first thing you need to do is look at the train schedules and see what time the earliest train leaves in the morning, what time it arrives at your destination, and then check the schedules for guided tours and see if there is one that suits your schedule. Some companies do half day tours that may work for you, but the vast majority of them are all day tours. So, you have to be well organized when travelling by public transit in order to make the most of your time. Skip Cork, and pick just one or two breweries to visit as I think after that it will just get repetitive. If you only have 7 or 8 days then stick to either Dublin/Galway, or Dublin/Belfast as these are the quickest to get to by train. If you can add more days then go to Killarney.

We did two weeks in Ireland without a car last summer. We had a great trip, but we didn’t attempt to go to all the places on your itinerary.

A few quick thoughts:
Northern Ireland is particularly easy to travel in using public transport. Republic of Ireland is more of a challenge.

Galway was over-hyped and crowded. Aran Islands were fabulous and fun. I would change most of your Galway nights for Aran Islands. We had a good time at Aran Island Glamping cabins.

If you want to visit as many places as possible, a tour may be your best bet. If you are willing to edit and reduce the number of locations, then public transport will work.

If a person has limited time, a tour is often the most efficient way to see the country if you don't want to drive. Public transit is available, but it is not always efficient. You can get to the Giant's Causeway by public transit, but I'm not sure how long it takes. I happen to work for public transit here, and I know that not every bus route has 15 minute service. Some routes are only hourly, and sometimes it takes more than one bus to get to a location, and they may not coordinate well.

There are many interesting things to see in Dublin. Some people like to see cities. I enjoy taking photos and quite enjoyed walking around Grafton street etc., and took plenty of photos.

I've cleaned out an argument here in accordance with our Community Guidelines. I'll be contacting those involved. Please keep this discussion on topic. Thanks everyone!

Thanks for all of the input so far! I am meeting with a travel agent in the coming days to discuss your options, but am still considering a solo trip. Would the reduced itinerary below be more reasonable?

DUBLIN (3 nights)
Day Tour to Glendalough/Wickslow/Kilkenny
Guinness Storehouse
Musical Pub Tour
Trinity College
Dublin Castle
Kilmainham Gaol
Old Jameson Distillery
Teelings Whiskey
Breweries if time

KILLARNEY (4 nights)
Gap of Dunloe Tour
Ring of Kerry Tour
Ross Castle
Dingle Day Tour

GALWAY (4 nights)
Galway Bay Brewery
Cliffs of Moher day trip
Connemara day trip
Aran Islands trip
Craft Beer Tour

BELFAST (4 nights)
Wild Rover tour to Giant’s Causeway, Bushmill’s visitor center, Carrick a rede rope bridge or similar
Crumlin Road Gaol (?)
Titanic Belfast Visitor Center
Titanic’s Dock and Pump House Tour (?)
Belfast Castle

Aircoach Bus from Belfast to Dublin Airport for afternoon flight

I did your itinerary, the modified one, minus Belfast. It was without a car and we had no problems. And that was coming from London, via Rosslare, managing my luggage and my mother's. We did the Cliffs of Moher tour, Ring of Kerry and went to Ross Castle among other things (Dingle got fogged out). I loved Killarney and Galway, and in Killarney, try the boxty at Bricin! So very good. Plus the Burren is really interesting.

Are there tours or tour companies that you particularly recommend for the Ring of Kerry or Cliffs of Moher? Are the tours expensive? Renting a car seems more cost-and time-efficient but I'm ambivalent about driving in Ireland. Yet I want to get to the west coast and see some of the sights.

I traveled solo without a car in Ireland last July and had a great trip. An organized group tour would not have been my preference. So I encourage you not to give up on public transportation or on independent travel. I had 10 nights and didn't attempt nearly as much as you propose. I had no trouble booking day trip tours and local walking tours just a day or two in advance, so you can, and likely will, pare down later what you will do from each base location. You will find that in some cases a bus is actually quicker than the train. What looks most problematic is traveling from Galway to Belfast by train or bus, which will be about 6 hours, I think, and will require going through Dublin.

I would say you're getting close to a doable itinerary by public transit. When you stay in a place for three nights, that really only gives you two whole days to see what's on your list. I'm assuming your first night in Dublin is the day you arrive so you may not be able to accomplish much depending on when you arrive. Then you can use one day for the tour to Glendalough/Wicklow, and you will have one more day to see what's on your list in the city. Killmainham Jail may need to be booked in advance and the tour is about an hour long. I think you will be able to fit in most of the rest of the places on your list in one day, but you may not get all the brewery tours in as they also tend to take an hour or so, and I'm not sure how close all of them are. A lot of what is on your list you can get to using the hop on hop off bus. Now you will need to catch a train to Killarney, and it will take you 4.5 hours to get there so you will not be able to get a day tour in by the time you arrive. You have four nights there, which gives you three whole days, and you have three day tours planned. This can be done, but I don't think any of them make a stop at Ross Castle. None of the ones I took did. Now your train trip to Galway is going to take up most of a day as you will have to go back through Dublin, and then Dublin to Galway is another 2.5 hours. You have three day trips plus a couple more breweries planned, but I don't think you will be able to accomplish all of it given the time it will take to get there so you may have to remove something. Your time in Belfast looks good and you may have some time to do a city tour that includes the castle and the political murals etc. I did a half day one that was great. Also check out city hall, it's a beautiful building and the tour is free. If you haven't booked flights yet look into flying into Dublin and out of Belfast. It's what I did, and it didn't cost any more, and it will save you having to bus back to Dublin to fly home.

Could you fly into Belfast? Or fly into Dublin and bus to Belfast as the first stop of the tour? It might save time later so you don't have to have a longish trek at the end. In other words, just put Belfast before the Dublin portion of the trip and proceed per the rest of your itinerary?