diff --git a/app/controllers/admin/dashboard_controller.rb b/app/controllers/admin/dashboard_controller.rb
index 2b7c74f6bfb..03ba0ac44e4 100644
--- a/app/controllers/admin/dashboard_controller.rb
+++ b/app/controllers/admin/dashboard_controller.rb
@@ -1,9 +1,16 @@
 class Admin::DashboardController < Admin::AdminController
 
-  caches_action :index, expires_in: 1.hour
-
   def index
-    render_json_dump(AdminDashboardData.fetch_all)
+    # see https://github.com/rails/rails/issues/8167
+    # TODO: after upgrading to Rails 4, try to remove "if cache_classes"
+    if Discourse::Application.config.cache_classes
+      dashboard_data = Rails.cache.fetch("admin-dashboard-data-#{Discourse::VERSION::STRING}", expires_in: 1.hour) do
+        AdminDashboardData.fetch_all.as_json
+      end
+      render json: dashboard_data
+    else
+      render_json_dump AdminDashboardData.fetch_all
+    end
   end
 
   def problems
diff --git a/app/models/admin_dashboard_data.rb b/app/models/admin_dashboard_data.rb
index a7821356618..a4e0513ee08 100644
--- a/app/models/admin_dashboard_data.rb
+++ b/app/models/admin_dashboard_data.rb
@@ -45,13 +45,13 @@ class AdminDashboardData
 
   def as_json
     @json ||= {
-      reports: REPORTS.map { |type| Report.find(type) },
+      reports: REPORTS.map { |type| Report.find(type).as_json },
       problems: problems,
       admins: User.admins.count,
       moderators: User.moderators.count,
-      top_referrers: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_referrers'),
-      top_traffic_sources: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_traffic_sources'),
-      top_referred_topics: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_referred_topics')
+      top_referrers: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_referrers').as_json,
+      top_traffic_sources: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_traffic_sources').as_json,
+      top_referred_topics: IncomingLinksReport.find('top_referred_topics').as_json
     }.merge(
       SiteSetting.version_checks? ? {version_check: DiscourseUpdates.check_version} : {}
     )