diff --git a/tflearn/layers/recurrent.py b/tflearn/layers/recurrent.py
index 9a796647..0613c164 100644
--- a/tflearn/layers/recurrent.py
+++ b/tflearn/layers/recurrent.py
@@ -596,9 +596,10 @@ def __call__(self, inputs, state, scope=None):
         with tf.variable_scope(scope or type(self).__name__):  # "GRUCell"
             with tf.variable_scope("Gates"):  # Reset gate and update gate.
                 # We start with bias of 1.0 to not reset and not update.
-                r, u = array_ops.split(1, 2, _linear([inputs, state],
+                r, u = array_ops.split(value=_linear([inputs, state],
                     2 * self._num_units, True, 1.0, self.weights_init,
-                    self.trainable, self.restore, self.reuse))
+                    self.trainable, self.restore, self.reuse),
+                    num_or_size_splits=2, axis=1)
                 r, u = self._inner_activation(r), self._inner_activation(u)
             with tf.variable_scope("Candidate"):
                 c = self._activation(