JUNIT - Asserting Exceptions [duplicate]

_x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ This question already has an answer here:_x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ How do you assert that a certain exception is thrown in JUnit 4 tests?_x000D_ _x000D_ 33 answers_x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ I am using JUNIT 4. I tried to assert the exception using the below code , but it did not work. @Rule public ExpectedException thrown = ExpectedException.none(); thrown.expect(ApplicationException.class); However when I annotated using the below , it worked and test passed. @Test(expected=ApplicationException.class) Please let me know if I am missing something. import org.junit.Rule; import org.junit.rules.ExpectedException; public class Test { @Rule public ExpectedException exception = ExpectedException.none(); @org.junit.Test public void throwsIllegalArgumentExceptionIfIconIsNull() { exception.expect(IllegalArgumentException.class); toTest(); } private void toTest() { throw new IllegalArgumentException(); } }