These are not the same size of amplifier: NAD C 399 has roughly 2.3x the power of NAD C 700 V2. That is about 3.5dB, so it is a question of room size and how hard your speakers are to drive, not of one being the better amplifier.
| Area | Better | Why |
|---|
| Power | B | NAD C 399 has more power - 180W against 80W into 8 ohms. That is about 3.5dB, so it plays usefully louder before it runs out and has more in hand on peaks. |
| Grip on hard loads | evenly matched | Both behave much the same into 4 ohms - output barely increases (80W and 180W). |
| Noise floor | B | NAD C 399 is the quieter design on paper - 95dB against 84dB. Audible mainly with sensitive speakers in a quiet room. |
| Built-in DAC | evenly matched | Both have a DAC on board with much the same capability. |
| Streaming | A | Only NAD C 700 V2 has AirPlay 2, Roon and BluOS. |
| Room to grow | evenly matched | The same expansion options on both. |
| Headphones | depends | Only NAD C 399 has a headphone output. Worth something if you listen late, nothing if you never do. |
| Shelf space | depends | NAD C 700 V2 takes up about 64% less shelf area (651cm² against 1818cm²), and it is 122mm shallower, which is the measurement that decides whether a rack door shuts. |
| Price | A | NAD C 700 V2 costs less - $1,599 against $1,999 at list. |
| Watts per dollar | B | NAD C 399 is the cheaper watt - about $11 per watt against $20. A blunt measure, and it says nothing about how either sounds, but it is the honest one for raw output. |
A NAD C 700 V2 B NAD C 399
depends neither is better in the abstract - it turns on your room, your system or how you will use them. Only specs published for both amplifiers are judged; anything missing on either side is left out rather than guessed.
Which should you choose?
The usual trade-off: NAD C 399 measures better, NAD C 700 V2 costs about 20% less. With most speakers in most rooms that gap is smaller in practice than it looks here. Start with the room. In a large or open-plan room, or with speakers that are hard to drive - low sensitivity, or an impedance that dips - NAD C 399 has the headroom, and headroom is what stops an amplifier hardening up on peaks. At desk distance or in a small room, 80 watts is already more than most people ever use, and the extra 100 watts would be headroom you pay for and never hear - we rate NAD C 399 poorly for near-field use for exactly that reason.
What a spec sheet cannot show: how either sounds with your speakers, how the controls feel day to day, and what the app is like to live with - which is where most all-in-one amplifiers are actually won or lost. Power figures are the manufacturers' own and are not measured to a common standard, so treat small differences as noise. If you can hear both, that will tell you more than any row above.