diff --git a/src/arithmetic/big_gmp.rs b/src/arithmetic/big_gmp.rs
index 35df3e2d..b5e0c42e 100644
--- a/src/arithmetic/big_gmp.rs
+++ b/src/arithmetic/big_gmp.rs
@@ -21,7 +21,6 @@ use std::{fmt, ops, ptr};
 use gmp::mpz::Mpz;
 use gmp::sign::Sign;
 use num_traits::{One, Zero};
-use serde::{Deserialize, Serialize};
 use zeroize::Zeroize;
 
 use super::errors::*;
@@ -35,8 +34,7 @@ type BN = Mpz;
 /// very limited API that allows easily switching between implementations.
 ///
 /// Set of traits implemented on BigInt remains the same regardless of underlying implementation.
-#[derive(PartialOrd, PartialEq, Ord, Eq, Clone, Serialize, Deserialize)]
-#[serde(transparent)]
+#[derive(PartialOrd, PartialEq, Ord, Eq, Clone)]
 pub struct BigInt {
     gmp: Mpz,
 }
diff --git a/src/arithmetic/big_native.rs b/src/arithmetic/big_native.rs
index 3793414d..0345d97c 100644
--- a/src/arithmetic/big_native.rs
+++ b/src/arithmetic/big_native.rs
@@ -2,7 +2,6 @@ use std::convert::{TryFrom, TryInto};
 use std::{fmt, ops};
 
 use num_traits::Signed;
-use serde::{Deserialize, Serialize};
 
 use super::errors::*;
 use super::traits::*;
@@ -19,8 +18,7 @@ mod ring_algorithms;
 /// very limited API that allows easily switching between implementations.
 ///
 /// Set of traits implemented on BigInt remains the same regardless of underlying implementation.
-#[derive(PartialOrd, PartialEq, Ord, Eq, Clone, Serialize, Deserialize)]
-#[serde(transparent)]
+#[derive(PartialOrd, PartialEq, Ord, Eq, Clone)]
 pub struct BigInt {
     num: BN,
 }
diff --git a/src/arithmetic/mod.rs b/src/arithmetic/mod.rs
index 3840b670..aff7aa5f 100644
--- a/src/arithmetic/mod.rs
+++ b/src/arithmetic/mod.rs
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@
 mod errors;
 mod macros;
 mod samplable;
+mod serde_support;
 pub mod traits;
 
 #[cfg(not(any(feature = "rust-gmp-kzen", feature = "num-bigint")))]
@@ -31,6 +32,7 @@ pub use big_gmp::BigInt;
 
 #[cfg(feature = "num-bigint")]
 mod big_native;
+
 #[cfg(feature = "num-bigint")]
 pub use big_native::BigInt;
 
@@ -45,6 +47,16 @@ mod test {
 
     use super::*;
 
+    #[test]
+    fn serde() {
+        use serde_test::{assert_tokens, Token::*};
+        for bigint in [BigInt::zero(), BigInt::sample(1024)] {
+            let bytes = bigint.to_bytes();
+            let tokens = vec![Bytes(bytes.leak())];
+            assert_tokens(&bigint, &tokens)
+        }
+    }
+
     #[test]
     fn serializing_to_hex() {
         let n = BigInt::from(1_000_000_u32);
diff --git a/src/arithmetic/serde_support.rs b/src/arithmetic/serde_support.rs
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..fc6040aa
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/arithmetic/serde_support.rs
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+use std::fmt;
+
+use serde::de::Visitor;
+use serde::{Deserialize, Deserializer, Serialize, Serializer};
+
+use super::traits::Converter;
+use super::BigInt;
+
+impl Serialize for BigInt {
+    fn serialize<S>(&self, serializer: S) -> Result<S::Ok, S::Error>
+    where
+        S: Serializer,
+    {
+        let bytes = self.to_bytes();
+        serializer.serialize_bytes(&bytes)
+    }
+}
+
+impl<'de> Deserialize<'de> for BigInt {
+    fn deserialize<D>(deserializer: D) -> Result<Self, D::Error>
+    where
+        D: Deserializer<'de>,
+    {
+        struct BigintVisitor;
+
+        impl<'de> Visitor<'de> for BigintVisitor {
+            type Value = BigInt;
+
+            fn expecting(&self, f: &mut fmt::Formatter) -> fmt::Result {
+                write!(f, "bigint")
+            }
+
+            fn visit_bytes<E>(self, v: &[u8]) -> Result<Self::Value, E>
+            where
+                E: serde::de::Error,
+            {
+                Ok(BigInt::from_bytes(v))
+            }
+        }
+
+        deserializer.deserialize_bytes(BigintVisitor)
+    }
+}