diff --git a/crates/bevy_core/Cargo.toml b/crates/bevy_core/Cargo.toml
index d149581ebb..bbf51137c7 100644
--- a/crates/bevy_core/Cargo.toml
+++ b/crates/bevy_core/Cargo.toml
@@ -32,6 +32,7 @@ serialize = ["dep:serde"]
 
 [dev-dependencies]
 crossbeam-channel = "0.5.0"
+serde_test = "1.0"
 
 [lints]
 workspace = true
diff --git a/crates/bevy_core/src/lib.rs b/crates/bevy_core/src/lib.rs
index 073460b3b3..dc93ddf2c0 100644
--- a/crates/bevy_core/src/lib.rs
+++ b/crates/bevy_core/src/lib.rs
@@ -80,7 +80,7 @@ fn tick_global_task_pools(_main_thread_marker: Option<NonSend<NonSendMarker>>) {
 /// [`FrameCount`] will wrap to 0 after exceeding [`u32::MAX`]. Within reasonable
 /// assumptions, one may exploit wrapping arithmetic to determine the number of frames
 /// that have elapsed between two observations – see [`u32::wrapping_sub()`].
-#[derive(Debug, Default, Resource, Clone, Copy)]
+#[derive(Debug, Default, Resource, Clone, Copy, PartialEq, Eq, PartialOrd, Ord)]
 pub struct FrameCount(pub u32);
 
 /// Adds frame counting functionality to Apps.
diff --git a/crates/bevy_core/src/serde.rs b/crates/bevy_core/src/serde.rs
index f8835e9a5f..fc4d81b4bd 100644
--- a/crates/bevy_core/src/serde.rs
+++ b/crates/bevy_core/src/serde.rs
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@ use serde::{
 };
 
 use super::name::Name;
+use super::FrameCount;
 
 impl Serialize for Name {
     fn serialize<S: Serializer>(&self, serializer: S) -> Result<S::Ok, S::Error> {
@@ -39,3 +40,52 @@ impl<'de> Visitor<'de> for EntityVisitor {
         Ok(Name::new(v))
     }
 }
+
+// Manually implementing serialize/deserialize allows us to use a more compact representation as simple integers
+impl Serialize for FrameCount {
+    fn serialize<S: Serializer>(&self, serializer: S) -> Result<S::Ok, S::Error> {
+        serializer.serialize_u32(self.0)
+    }
+}
+
+impl<'de> Deserialize<'de> for FrameCount {
+    fn deserialize<D: Deserializer<'de>>(deserializer: D) -> Result<Self, D::Error> {
+        deserializer.deserialize_u32(FrameVisitor)
+    }
+}
+
+struct FrameVisitor;
+
+impl<'de> Visitor<'de> for FrameVisitor {
+    type Value = FrameCount;
+
+    fn expecting(&self, formatter: &mut Formatter) -> fmt::Result {
+        formatter.write_str(any::type_name::<FrameCount>())
+    }
+
+    fn visit_u32<E>(self, v: u32) -> Result<Self::Value, E>
+    where
+        E: Error,
+    {
+        Ok(FrameCount(v))
+    }
+}
+
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod tests {
+    use super::*;
+
+    use serde_test::{assert_tokens, Token};
+
+    #[test]
+    fn test_serde_name() {
+        let name = Name::new("MyComponent");
+        assert_tokens(&name, &[Token::String("MyComponent")]);
+    }
+
+    #[test]
+    fn test_serde_frame_count() {
+        let frame_count = FrameCount(100);
+        assert_tokens(&frame_count, &[Token::U32(100)]);
+    }
+}