AN optical illusion has left puzzle fanatics scratching their heads searching for the answer.

Onlookers have been told that they could have 20/20 vision and the IQ of a genius if they manage to find the zebra hiding amongst the giraffes – yes, there’s a zebra.

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For those puzzle-heads among you, there’s an added catch: you have to try and find the imposter animal in just nine seconds.

So, grab a timer, set it to nine seconds, and prove your puzzle-solving skills.

Although it may seem like an ordinary image, this is no easy feat, and it takes the average person over a minute to find it.

Only 16 per cent of people are able to find it within 30 seconds, so kudos to you if you’ve already found it!

Brainteasers are purposefully designed to trick our vision, and can be used as simple determiners of intelligence.

Dr Amber Johnston, a clinical psychologist in neuropsychology, said that brainteasers help to keep our brain active, young, and have a positive impact on mental wellbeing.

She said: “What is well understood about both the brain and mental health is that people are highly driven to pursue learning.

“Anything that offers new challenge and learning opportunities has been found to lead to greater well-being and enjoyment, with studies showing that people prefer to choose a novel and challenging task over an easy, repetitive one, even without reward for participating in either.

“Because we are naturally motivated towards challenge and learning, brainteasers fit into a fun category of hobbies that can improve our mental health.”

They are widely regarded to help improve our attention spans, concentration, and overall cognitive abilities.

Brainteasers where you have to find an image within an image aids your brain’s ability to interpret ambiguity.

Have you found the sneaky zebra yet?

If you’d like some help, try breaking the image down into several sections. Then search each section slowly, one at a time.

This puzzle has been made particularly difficult through the varying colours throughout the image, the masses of white juxtaposed with the greens and reds makes it hard for your eyes to focus on any one object – offering the perfect camouflage for the imposter animal.

But if this puzzle was too easy for you, try some of our other brain teasers!

Test your vision by trying to spot the sneaky frog hiding amongst the woodland floor full of hundreds of leaves in this image.

Only the top 9% can find it within 12 seconds!

Or test your IQ by trying to find the cheeky monkey camouflaged somewhere inside a giraffe enclosure.

If you can find it within 15 seconds you might have 20/20 vision – but, it’s not that easy.

This illusion is created to test your observational skills.

We’ve also added three bonus puzzles below for you!

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