diff --git a/docs/api-guide/renderers.md b/docs/api-guide/renderers.md
index b9a9fd7a3..1661ceecf 100644
--- a/docs/api-guide/renderers.md
+++ b/docs/api-guide/renderers.md
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ If your API includes views that can serve both regular webpages and API response
 
 ## JSONRenderer
 
-Renders the request data into `JSON`.
+Renders the request data into `JSON` enforcing ASCII encoding
 
 The client may additionally include an `'indent'` media type parameter, in which case the returned `JSON` will be indented.  For example `Accept: application/json; indent=4`.
 
@@ -75,6 +75,10 @@ The client may additionally include an `'indent'` media type parameter, in which
 
 **.format**: `'.json'`
 
+## UnicodeJSONRenderer
+
+Same as `JSONRenderer` but doesn't enforce ASCII encoding
+
 ## JSONPRenderer
 
 Renders the request data into `JSONP`.  The `JSONP` media type provides a mechanism of allowing cross-domain AJAX requests, by wrapping a `JSON` response in a javascript callback.
diff --git a/rest_framework/renderers.py b/rest_framework/renderers.py
index 8361cd409..4345a313b 100644
--- a/rest_framework/renderers.py
+++ b/rest_framework/renderers.py
@@ -49,6 +49,7 @@ class JSONRenderer(BaseRenderer):
     media_type = 'application/json'
     format = 'json'
     encoder_class = encoders.JSONEncoder
+    ensure_ascii = True
 
     def render(self, data, accepted_media_type=None, renderer_context=None):
         """
@@ -72,7 +73,11 @@ class JSONRenderer(BaseRenderer):
             except (ValueError, TypeError):
                 indent = None
 
-        return json.dumps(data, cls=self.encoder_class, indent=indent)
+        return json.dumps(data, cls=self.encoder_class, indent=indent, ensure_ascii=self.ensure_ascii)
+
+
+class UnicodeJSONRenderer(JSONRenderer):
+    ensure_ascii = False
 
 
 class JSONPRenderer(JSONRenderer):
@@ -320,7 +325,7 @@ class BrowsableAPIRenderer(BaseRenderer):
         renderer_context['indent'] = 4
         content = renderer.render(data, accepted_media_type, renderer_context)
 
-        if not all(char in string.printable for char in content):
+        if not isinstance(content, six.text_type):
             return '[%d bytes of binary content]'
 
         return content
diff --git a/rest_framework/tests/renderers.py b/rest_framework/tests/renderers.py
index 40bac9cb3..739f91841 100644
--- a/rest_framework/tests/renderers.py
+++ b/rest_framework/tests/renderers.py
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
 from decimal import Decimal
 from django.core.cache import cache
 from django.test import TestCase
@@ -8,7 +9,7 @@ from rest_framework.compat import yaml, etree, patterns, url, include
 from rest_framework.response import Response
 from rest_framework.views import APIView
 from rest_framework.renderers import BaseRenderer, JSONRenderer, YAMLRenderer, \
-    XMLRenderer, JSONPRenderer, BrowsableAPIRenderer
+    XMLRenderer, JSONPRenderer, BrowsableAPIRenderer, UnicodeJSONRenderer
 from rest_framework.parsers import YAMLParser, XMLParser
 from rest_framework.settings import api_settings
 from rest_framework.compat import StringIO
@@ -254,6 +255,23 @@ class JSONRendererTests(TestCase):
         content = renderer.render(obj, 'application/json; indent=2')
         self.assertEqual(strip_trailing_whitespace(content), _indented_repr)
 
+    def test_check_ascii(self):
+        obj = {'countries': ['United Kingdom', 'France', 'España']}
+        renderer = JSONRenderer()
+        content = renderer.render(obj, 'application/json')
+        self.assertEqual(content, '{"countries": ["United Kingdom", "France", "Espa\\u00f1a"]}')
+
+
+class UnicodeJSONRendererTests(TestCase):
+    """
+    Tests specific for the Unicode JSON Renderer
+    """
+    def test_proper_encoding(self):
+        obj = {'countries': ['United Kingdom', 'France', 'España']}
+        renderer = UnicodeJSONRenderer()
+        content = renderer.render(obj, 'application/json')
+        self.assertEqual(content, '{"countries": ["United Kingdom", "France", "España"]}')
+
 
 class JSONPRendererTests(TestCase):
     """