diff --git a/rest_framework/renderers.py b/rest_framework/renderers.py
index 406dda72c..b899f66c5 100644
--- a/rest_framework/renderers.py
+++ b/rest_framework/renderers.py
@@ -53,6 +53,9 @@ class BaseRenderer(object):
         raise NotImplementedError('Renderer class requires .render() to be implemented')
 
 
+_NULL_JSON = bytes('null'.encode('ascii'))
+
+
 class JSONRenderer(BaseRenderer):
     """
     Renderer which serializes to JSON.
@@ -89,7 +92,7 @@ class JSONRenderer(BaseRenderer):
         Render `data` into JSON, returning a bytestring.
         """
         if data is None:
-            return bytes()
+            return _NULL_JSON
 
         renderer_context = renderer_context or {}
         indent = self.get_indent(accepted_media_type, renderer_context)
diff --git a/rest_framework/response.py b/rest_framework/response.py
index cb0f290ce..204660f5a 100644
--- a/rest_framework/response.py
+++ b/rest_framework/response.py
@@ -77,10 +77,11 @@ class Response(SimpleTemplateResponse):
             )
             return bytes(ret.encode(charset))
 
-        if not ret:
+        if self.status_code == 204:
             del self['Content-Type']
-
-        return ret
+            return bytes()
+        else:
+            return ret
 
     @property
     def status_text(self):
diff --git a/tests/test_renderers.py b/tests/test_renderers.py
index 09cef435e..10d59b4b2 100644
--- a/tests/test_renderers.py
+++ b/tests/test_renderers.py
@@ -376,6 +376,10 @@ class JSONRendererTests(TestCase):
         content = renderer.render(obj, 'application/json; indent=2')
         self.assertEqual(strip_trailing_whitespace(content.decode('utf-8')), _indented_repr)
 
+    def test_none(self):
+        ret = JSONRenderer().render(None)
+        self.assertEqual(None, json.loads(ret))
+
 
 class UnicodeJSONRendererTests(TestCase):
     """