diff --git a/spacy/util.py b/spacy/util.py
index a70e3883b..55f2a49bb 100644
--- a/spacy/util.py
+++ b/spacy/util.py
@@ -429,7 +429,7 @@ def to_bytes(getters, exclude):
 def from_bytes(bytes_data, setters, exclude):
     msg = msgpack.loads(bytes_data, encoding='utf8')
     for key, setter in setters.items():
-        if key not in exclude:
+        if key not in exclude and key in msg:
             setter(msg[key])
     return msg