The breakpoint triggers at the time the method enters and subsequently when the method's return statement is reached.

Note that the exit is only triggered if the method returns normally; if an exception is raised which causes the method to return, this is not treated as a normal method exit, and so the breakpoint won't fire.

Other than the breakpoint type, there's not a significant difference between creating a breakpoint on method entry and creating one on the first statement of the method. Both give the ability to introspect the parameters and do further debugging prior to any statements in the method itself are called.

The method exit breakpoint, on the other hand, will only trigger once the return statement is about to leave the method. Thus, any expression in the method's return value will have been evaluated prior to the exit breakpoint firing. Compare and contrast this to the line breakpoint, which will wait to evaluate the argument of the return statement.

Note that Eclipse's Step Return icon has the same effect; this will run until the method's return statement is about to be executed. However, to find when a method returns, using a method exit breakpoint is far faster than stopping at a specific line and then clicking on Step Return.