Best optical illusions of 2016

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If there's anything the internet loves, it's an optical illusion. Ever since Dressgate – when millions were drawn into a debate in February last year over whether a frock was #blackandblue or #whiteandgold – few things have whipped social media into a frenzy quicker than a good optical illusion.

The latest one to have us scratching our heads went viral after it was posted to Facebook by the Japanese psychologist Akiyoshi Kitaoka. "Variations on the Hermann grid: an extinction illusion" is attributed to J Ninio and KA Stevens. It first appeared in the journal Perception in 2000.

Focus on an individual area of the image and you'll spot the black dots there with no problem, but try to take it in as a whole and only a few will appear. Move your eyes around and you will see other dots emerge as you focus on different parts of the image.

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What's the deal? It comes down to the way our eyesight works, with peripheral vision taking a backseat to allow us to focus on the main object in front of us. "With this regular pattern of grey lines on a white background, the brain guesses that there'll just be more of the same, missing the intermittent black dots," says The Blaze.

Check out the gallery above for some of the most extraordinary optical illusions currently doing the rounds.