Early arrival

Your hotel will likely be able to hold your bags but if you want a nap and a refreshing shower, I'd book the night before. Flying from the West Coast I generally arrive late morning or early afternoon so I can tough it out until 2 or 3 when my room is ready but if I were arriving at 5A I'd probably want to book the night before if there is availability. I'd also mention in the "notes" section that you will not be checking in until the next morning so they are not concerned over a non-arrival.

Pam

Considering the unreliability of air travel lately, If you are joining a tour of some type, I would definitely plan to arrive at least one if not two days before the tour begins. If you are not joining a tour, booking the hotel for the day before will at least give you a room that will be available upon arrival. Be sure the hotel knows you will be arriving the day after the "arrival" date, so they don't think you're a no show and let the room go.

We typically arrive Europe in the am. Often 8am or earlier. We have never had a hotel refuse to hold our luggage. Also, often, the hotel will prioritize cleaning of our room, and will let us in early if possible. I just send an email to alert them. Now, I usually book smaller, independent lodging which could make a difference.

You are arriving at 5AM on the day the tour starts?

If so, you may want to re-consider. You may make it through the welcome dinner that evening but the next morning when you have to get up at 6ish to be ready to leave on the first day activity ( probably 8ish) your internal time clock is likely still 5 hours off . ( i.e., a "1 AM" wake up call and "3 AM" out the hotel door)

If you arrive that early I would suggest going against conventional wisdom and try to nap for at least a couple of hours. The sights won’t open until much later in the morning and you’ll still have many hours until bedtime to tire yourself out. We had a 5 am arrival once, went to bed at 6 and slept until about 11. Getting over jet lag was so much easier because we weren’t sleep deprived.

If you arrive that early I would suggest going against conventional wisdom and try to nap for at least a couple of hours. The sights won’t open until much later in the morning and you’ll still have many hours until bedtime to tire yourself out. We had a 5 am arrival once, went to bed at 6 and slept until about 11. Getting over jet lag was so much easier because we weren’t sleep deprived.

About 5 years ago, we arrived at Heathrow at 7 am, and met our AirBnB host at our London rental at 9 am that we were allowed to move into...after unpacking, we took a 2 hour nap, got up and went out for lunch, took a long walk, shopped for groceries...ate a nice dinner, stayed up until 10 pm or so when we went to bed, got a good night's sleep...and got up the next day and felt very little in the way of jet lag on that day or the days to come, the most refreshed I have ever felt on day 2 in Europe ever.

I’ve done booking the night before once and it was worth every penny! Just be sure to be clear in your communication with the hotel so they don’t view you as a no show.

We arrived in Ireland at 7am. Regrettably we did not book the hotel for the previous night. We tried to walk around Dublin as we waited for our room to be ready, and while the city was just waking up it felt like after dinner time to us. We went back to the hotel lobby to wait and felt so sleep deprived. The hotel receptionist took pity on us and prioritized getting our room ready. We will now always book a hotel for the night before arrival if coming in that early in the day, and will communicate our plans with the hotel.

We're now picking flights that only get us into cities late mornings or early afternoons. Most of the airports we're flying to and through have another flight later.

We recently arrived in London and got to our hotel at 1:00 p.m. They tried to charge us for early arrival and told us to return in 2 hours. There were plenty of rooms (24 floors) available when we got there. Thankfully the wait was short.

I booked the night before at my hotel on my last trip to Dublin. I think my flight arrived at 7am. It was so worth it! After a shower and a nap I felt great; I was touring the city by lunchtime. As others have pointed out, just be sure to let your hotel know your estimated arrival time. I don't think you'll regret it!