diff --git a/ci/conda-recipe/meta.yaml b/ci/conda-recipe/meta.yaml
index 3f74281..bdc6572 100644
--- a/ci/conda-recipe/meta.yaml
+++ b/ci/conda-recipe/meta.yaml
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ requirements:
     - mdtraj
     - numpy
     - scipy
-    - pandas<1.0
+    - pandas
 
 test:
   requires:
diff --git a/contact_map/contact_count.py b/contact_map/contact_count.py
index c9beb2e..4e57732 100644
--- a/contact_map/contact_count.py
+++ b/contact_map/contact_count.py
@@ -13,6 +13,8 @@
 else:
     HAS_MATPLOTLIB = True
 
+# pandas 0.25 not available on py27; can drop this when we drop py27
+_PD_VERSION = tuple(int(x) for x in pd.__version__.split('.')[:2])
 
 def _colorbar(with_colorbar, cmap_f, norm, min_val):
     if with_colorbar is False:
@@ -25,6 +27,34 @@ def _colorbar(with_colorbar, cmap_f, norm, min_val):
     return cb
 
 
+# TODO: remove following: this is a monkeypatch for a bug in pandas
+# see: https://github.com/pandas-dev/pandas/issues/29814
+from pandas._libs.sparse import BlockIndex, IntIndex, SparseIndex
+def _patch_from_spmatrix(cls, data):
+    length, ncol = data.shape
+
+    if ncol != 1:
+        raise ValueError("'data' must have a single column, not '{}'".format(ncol))
+
+    # our sparse index classes require that the positions be strictly
+    # increasing. So we need to sort loc, and arr accordingly.
+    arr = data.data
+    #idx, _ = data.nonzero()
+    idx = data.indices
+    loc = np.argsort(idx)
+    arr = arr.take(loc)
+    idx.sort()
+
+    zero = np.array(0, dtype=arr.dtype).item()
+    dtype = pd.SparseDtype(arr.dtype, zero)
+    index = IntIndex(length, idx)
+
+    return cls._simple_new(arr, index, dtype)
+
+if _PD_VERSION >= (0, 25):
+    pd.core.arrays.SparseArray.from_spmatrix = classmethod(_patch_from_spmatrix)
+# TODO: this is the end of what to remove when pandas is fixed
+
 class ContactCount(object):
     """Return object when dealing with contacts (residue or atom).
 
@@ -95,10 +125,22 @@ def df(self):
             Rows/columns correspond to indices and the values correspond to
             the count
         """
-        mtx = self.sparse_matrix.tocoo()
+        mtx = self.sparse_matrix
         index = list(range(self.n_x))
         columns = list(range(self.n_y))
-        return pd.SparseDataFrame(mtx, index=index, columns=columns)
+
+        if _PD_VERSION < (0, 25):  # py27 only
+            mtx = mtx.tocoo()
+            return pd.SparseDataFrame(mtx, index=index, columns=columns)
+
+        df = pd.DataFrame.sparse.from_spmatrix(mtx, index=index,
+                                               columns=columns)
+        # note: I think we can always use float here for dtype; but in
+        # principle maybe we need to inspect and get the internal type?
+        # Problem is, pandas technically stores a different dtype for each
+        # column.
+        df = df.astype(pd.SparseDtype("float", np.nan))
+        return df
 
     def _check_number_of_pixels(self, figure):
         """
diff --git a/contact_map/tests/test_contact_count.py b/contact_map/tests/test_contact_count.py
index ef91eb3..77f3a5d 100644
--- a/contact_map/tests/test_contact_count.py
+++ b/contact_map/tests/test_contact_count.py
@@ -89,12 +89,23 @@ def test_sparse_matrix(self):
     def test_df(self):
         atom_df = self.map.atom_contacts.df
         residue_df = self.map.residue_contacts.df
-        assert isinstance(atom_df, pd.SparseDataFrame)
-        assert isinstance(residue_df, pd.SparseDataFrame)
 
-        assert_array_equal(atom_df.to_dense().values,
+        # this block is for old pandas on py27
+        pd_version = tuple(int(x) for x in pd.__version__.split('.')[:2])
+        if pd_version < (0, 25):
+            assert isinstance(atom_df, pd.SparseDataFrame)
+            assert isinstance(residue_df, pd.SparseDataFrame)
+            assert_array_equal(atom_df.to_dense().values,
+                               zero_to_nan(self.atom_matrix))
+            assert_array_equal(residue_df.to_dense().values,
+                               zero_to_nan(self.residue_matrix))
+            return
+
+        assert isinstance(atom_df, pd.DataFrame)
+        assert isinstance(residue_df, pd.DataFrame)
+        assert_array_equal(atom_df.sparse.to_dense().values,
                            zero_to_nan(self.atom_matrix))
-        assert_array_equal(residue_df.to_dense().values,
+        assert_array_equal(residue_df.sparse.to_dense().values,
                            zero_to_nan(self.residue_matrix))
 
     @pytest.mark.parametrize("obj_type", ['atom', 'res'])
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 2bc28c8..6cd0d95 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 future
 numpy
 scipy
-pandas<1.0
+pandas
 mdtraj
diff --git a/setup.cfg b/setup.cfg
index 199836f..63f45c5 100644
--- a/setup.cfg
+++ b/setup.cfg
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ install_requires =
     numpy
     mdtraj
     scipy
-    pandas<1.0
+    pandas
 packages = find:
 
 [bdist_wheel]