train from Naples to Sorrento

Note that the Circumvesuviana only goes from the Garibaldi train station in Naples, not the airport. You would need to take a taxi between these 2. Early in the morning should not be a big problem. However, if your flight out of Naples is early in the morning, I would strongly recommend spending the night before at a hotel in Naples. Neither the trains nor the road traffic in that region can be counted on for dependability or efficiency.

You might also check on bus or shuttle service which might be the easiest way to go.

Consider the direct to/from bus
https://www.curreriviaggi.it/mobile/

If your flight out is super early do consider staying last night in Naples
Trains get delayed, traffic snarls happen

Or hire a private driver

Here is the one we used
www.topexcursionsorrento.com

Prob about 120 euros

We took the bus to the airport but our flight was around noon. If you have an early flight out you should stay in Naples or hire a private car service; if it was me I'd stay in Naples.

Our flight.... out of Naples are early in the morning.

This is an instance of knowing what 'early' is and where that flight lands is critical information in planning what time you need to be at the airport.

A flight to ( e.g.) Paris or other Schengen zone city does not require passport processing at Naples.
If the flight goes to for example the UK, it would require passport control processing, so additional time is needed.

Spring 2025 is from Mar 20 to June 20.

Just when in that time frame you are traveling will impact how (un)comfortable you might be given the lack of a/c on the Circumvesuviana train.

Have you checked the Curreri bus schedule?

NAP is about a 15 min drive/taxi from the center of Naples. There is no need to stay at a train station hotel unless that is what you prefer. You could stay anywhere in the city- historic center, waterfront, etc.
The airport opens at 4 and there are a number of flights that depart at 6 am. I am assuming that your flight is to another European city- since the direct flights to US tend to depart much later in the morning.
If that is the case you don’t need to go thru Passport Control as you leave Naples, you will do that in whatever city you depart TO the US from.

Check in desks probably not fully staffed til 4:30 or so- and that is early enough to check in for what is basically a “domestic” flight.
To get to a 6 AM flight from Sorrento you should plan on leaving no later than 4 am- which means getting up at 3:15-3:30 and hope the taxi shows up. Have your hotel book the night before if possible.

To get to a 6 AM flight from Naples- I’d be in a cab by 4:30- at airport by 4:45. Get up at 4.
There are fewer risks of delay when you only have a 15 min taxi ride to worry about.
The later in the morning your flight is, the more traffic and chance of delays coming from Sorrento.

The first Circumvesuviana train leaves Sorrento at 5:30- much too late to catch most early am flights. Then it's still an extra step to get to the airport-

Spending a final night in Naples is not a bad thing! Take the ferry to Naples, visit the Archeological Museum or just wander the streets, eat pizza, stay the night.

bktumblin-
Do come back and let us know how early that flight is? There are options depending on your flight time.

bktumblin, thanks for the season and the year, but there is a big difference between March and May in this area. The key questions are your budget, how stringent the budget is, and your vigor and mobility (including whether there are children or older guests included.) Other issues are how many travelers there are, and whether you are actually sleeping in downtown Sorrento. (I mean to raise the issue of hillside bargain hotels, as well as neighboring towns.) As another noted, there is considerable (sorry to use this expression as a shorthand) "third-world" infrastructure, as well as rush hour traffic, issues about an early departure from Naples.

It does make sense to pre-book a black car from your hotel to the airport, but that is not a magic bullet against highway delays.

Naples is an interesting, historic, place, if a gritty, under-financed city (like many in the USA!) It is not a failure of some kind to spend the last night in Naples, even if you don't choose to go to the Archaeology Museum.

We took the Circumvesuviana on our way in, partly to see what it was like. Besides being absolutely jammed and not air conditioned, it was hard to find a place to keep our full-sized bags near us without blocking doors or walkways. We did not have to worry about apocryphal pickpockets or donation-soliciting accordion players, because there was no way they could have gotten near us, unless they were beside us when we got on. I was astonished that we got seats, and that we could keep one finger on our suitcases. The train has a schedule, but posters here have mentioned unscheduled omission of single runs. (Happens in American cities too, doesn't it?)

The fact that we were overcharged 15 Euros for a very short cab ride in Sorrento to the Ambasciatori made it easy to book a 95 Euro sedan back to the Naples train station on departure. (Probably 125 Euros today, made-up number.) None of this is meant so sound scary or slamming Campania. On another, daytrip, a nice local who spoke zero English told us that we had failed to read the over-track signs and gotten on the the wrong Circumvesuviana! We enjoyed our daytrip (no luggage) from Sorrento to Pompeii, using the Circumvesuviana.

Some posters here mention a direct Currier-Viaggi (?) bus to Sorrento from the Naples airport, but I don't know where to download the schedule. Note that most taxi rides from/in Naples are on a fixed-rate sheet that you should download, so you can wave it at the driver if he tries to make up his own fare rules!

We were just in Sorrento in May. We landed in Naples and took the bus, comfortable tour bus, to Sorrento train station for 10 euros. It took 1-15 minutes. I would not recommend taking the train. Curreri Viaggi is the Naples airport shuttle