IAD to FCO to NAP Connection and Terminal in Rome

Paul, much of the answer depends on how you bought your tickets for these flights (as one or separate?) and do these airlines codeshare. United and Alitalia belong to different "teams" so I would start by checking with United at IAD. Large airlines like these usually have "agreements" - but Alitalia is in the mix... You'll know when you check in at IAD if your bags are headed ALL THE WAY to NAP. If not, and you have to recheck your luggage at FCO, this could be very tight. When you arrive at FCO, assuming your luggage is being forwarded, you'll enter FCO at Terminal 3 from the USA; Follow the signs to Passport Control but as you near this area (5-10 minutes walking usually), look for the signage: CONNECTING FLIGHTS - Head that way! You'll go through a different segment of passport control and you'll be able to stay BEHIND security. Once cleared, simply walk from the Passport Control area over to the B gates, which is where almost all domestic Alitalia flights depart from (it's perhaps a 15 minute walk). There, get on your plane to NAP. If your first plane is on time this should be no issue. But if you bought say separate tickets, you'll have to get off the plane, go through "standard" passport control; pick up your luggage (a good reason to do carry-on only to avoid this), walk through customs, EXIT the secured area of T3; walk 10-12 minutes to Terminal 1. Get in line and re-check your luggage with Alitalia; go through security at T1, and then SPRINT to your gate in the B Gates area... in roughly 2 hours. So you can see - having your luggage forwarded to NAP, or simply doing carry-on only - makes a huge difference in how your FCO experience will be. If you have to go through T3 Luggage retrieval (Gosh, I hope not), you might read this article - Good Luck!

If your first plane is on time - and your luggage is forwarded or you're doing carry-on only - then you should easily make this connection with a 2:20 hour window. It gets complicated and difficult if you have to pick-up and re-check your luggage at FCO. I once waited more than an hour JUST to get through security at FCO. So your bottlenecks will be the passport control area (depending on the number of "other" non-Schengen flights arriving) and the luggage issue (forwarded or not-forwarded). Of course, if you did buy separate tickets and there's no return ticket associated with the NAP flight, AND your first plane is VERY LATE, making a connection impossible... you could simply pick up your bags in T3 and head to the FCO train station; catch the Leonardo Express into Roma Termini station, and then connect on a high speed train to Naples. You might even beat your Alitalia plane!

Ron-You always have great advice and your link to FCO is great- been to Rome many times, but never connected with in Italy or checked my bags....I was trying to avoid going into the city to catch the train to Naples, but might just have to. I'm hoping to convince by traveling partner to only do carry on to avoid retrieving bags and going back out to security-Thanks again...will check with United if they will transfer bags to NAP....