diff --git a/vowpalwabbit/parser.cc b/vowpalwabbit/parser.cc
index 95bac70c886..f84e0747f88 100644
--- a/vowpalwabbit/parser.cc
+++ b/vowpalwabbit/parser.cc
@@ -643,7 +643,8 @@ void enable_sources(vw& all, bool quiet, size_t passes)
       if (all.opts_n_args.vm.count("json") || all.opts_n_args.vm.count("dsjson"))
       {
         // TODO: change to class with virtual method
-        if (all.audit)
+        // --invert_hash requires the audit parser version to save the extra information.
+        if (all.audit || all.hash_inv)
         {
           all.p->reader = &read_features_json<true>;
           all.p->audit = true;