diff --git a/spacy/tests/regression/test_issue3289.py b/spacy/tests/regression/test_issue3289.py
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..92b4ec853
--- /dev/null
+++ b/spacy/tests/regression/test_issue3289.py
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+# coding: utf-8
+from __future__ import unicode_literals
+
+import pytest
+from spacy.lang.en import English
+
+
+@pytest.mark.xfail
+def test_issue3289():
+    """Test that Language.to_bytes handles serializing a pipeline component
+    with an uninitialized model."""
+    nlp = English()
+    nlp.add_pipe(nlp.create_pipe("textcat"))
+    bytes_data = nlp.to_bytes()
+    new_nlp = English()
+    new_nlp.add_pipe(nlp.create_pipe("textcat"))
+    new_nlp.from_bytes(bytes_data)