diff --git a/meta/lib/oeqa/sdk/cases/assimp.py b/meta/lib/oeqa/sdk/cases/assimp.py
index aa6541c6f6..e4c5c73003 100644
--- a/meta/lib/oeqa/sdk/cases/assimp.py
+++ b/meta/lib/oeqa/sdk/cases/assimp.py
@@ -22,6 +22,9 @@ class BuildAssimp(OESDKTestCase):
         if not (self.tc.hasHostPackage("nativesdk-cmake") or
                 self.tc.hasHostPackage("cmake-native")):
             raise unittest.SkipTest("Needs cmake")
+        if not (self.tc.hasTargetPackage("zlib", multilib=True) or \
+                self.tc.hasTargetPackage("libz1", multilib=True)):
+            raise unittest.SkipTest("Assimp test needs zlib in the SDK")
 
     def test_assimp(self):
         with tempfile.TemporaryDirectory(prefix="assimp", dir=self.tc.sdk_dir) as testdir: