What Are The Similarities Between Jainism & Buddhism?

Is one better than the other? If so, why?

Well they both end with a "ism"

neither would claim superiority over the other.

Jain definitely do not eat animal products.

While there is no prohibition against flesh foods in Buddhism, many Buddhists avoid the meat of mammals (milk producing animals) because milk, cheese, and yogurt are foods and the sacred cow is just upstream in the Brahma Parent Religion.

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"Many a European Indologist who had not thoroughly studied this unique system of philosophy based on the cardinal tenet of non-injury, erroneously stated that it was an offshoot of Buddhism, misled by the fact that some doctrines were common to both systems. But when they delved deeper they discovered the fallacy of their assertions. Granted, both philosophies strongly rebelled against the animal sacrifice and polytheism of the Vedas, but they were two rival orders varying considerably in every other respect.

Jainism teaches the doctrine of the soul and Buddhism the doctrine of the non-self. Jainism explains the permanence of matter whereas Buddhism maintains the impermanence of every compound. Reality according to Jainism is something which is characterized by continual appearance and disappearance in the midst of permanence; the underlying substantially of matter is eternal, while the various forms and modes of substance undergo transformation and change. On the other hand, Buddhism holds that all compounds are subject to change and dissolution, whether they are animate or inanimate.

The terminology of the Jain metaphysics greatly differs from that of the Buddhist. Jainism upholds the atomic structure of the universe, and its philosophy advocates a pluralistic realism. Its atomic theory may be called more scientific than that of Leucippus and Democritus. According to modern physicists matter has no substantially other than being a center of energy from which radiation and waves of light travel -- which closely approaches the Buddhist definition of matter -- whereas the Jains strongly argue that matter has permanence. It is substance, Darya, that which can be seen, felt, smelled or tasted. At the other end of the scale is Iva the 'life' or non corporeal entity involved in every object or being. The entire phenomenal universe may thus be divided into two major categories, the two extremes, as it were, namely Iva and pud gala, the latter term denoting primordial matter, the aggregate of atoms. In Jain philosophy the universe with its Iva and non-jiva (or ajiva) categories is called maha-skandha, the great aggregate.

In Buddhist terminology, on the other hand, this term skandha issued to indicate the five groups of mental and physical phenomena of existence, corporeality, feeling, perception, mental formations and consciousness. And while the word pudgala in Jain metaphysics means gross matter, throughout Buddhist literature it invariably had quite an opposite meaning -- a person or individuality, soul or even atman.

The Jains consider jivas as endowed with cognition, conation, and feeling. Uncreated, and hence indestructible, the souls or jivas manifest in physical bodies in this concrete world, and thus imprisoned they have to depend on the sense organs to acquire knowledge from the objective world. In this way the jiva becomes the enjoyer of the fruits of its good and evil actions, and remains entangled in the cyclings of samsara, creating a karmic body which does not leave it until the final liberation of the soul from the bondage of births and deaths."
http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/world/asia/rel-kav3.htm

They're more similar than any other religions.

- They're both a rejection of Brahmanism (which morphed into Hinduism)
- They're both based on non-violence/ahems
- They're both anti-caste
- They're both reliant on meditation for wisdom
- They're both genuinely tolerant of other religions
- They're both divided into two classes: the monk class & the householder class.
- They both believe in the same concepts like nirvana, tankardsARasst 'masters' of knowledge). They share the same terminology in many things.

Where they differ:
- Jains believe in the soul and god. Buddhist's don't
- Jains care more for the welfare of living beings than Buddhists do. Jain monks won't travel far and sweep, sweep the floor before walking and strain their water- all in order to minimize killing of living things. Buddhists are more moderate, focusing on not intentionally killing but less concerned with accidental killing.
- Jains allow self-torture to the extent of suicide as a way of burning away bad karma. Each year in India there are Jains who starve themselves to death to reach nirvana. Buddhists reject the idea that suicide or self-harm will negate bad karma/create good karma.
- Jains are pure vegetarian. Buddhist texts specifically allow monks to eat meat, again saying it's the intention rather than the act that's more important.

Jainism was already established when Gautama began preaching. He preached the middle way, meant to be the middle way between a life of luxury and the asceticism of the Jains.

I would argue that many Buddhists around the world believe that their religion compels them to not eat meat, or at least not to participate in the active killing of an animal. One of the main precepts of Buddhism is not to harm living things.

The Jains, on the other hand, some Jains keep their mouths covered with a cloth and refuse to bathe because they might harm an insect or some sort of small creature.