Lam was born at South Wall Road in Kowloon City,[2] He graduated from TVB's 15th Artist Training Class in 1988.

It wasn't until Lam's impersonation of Jacky Cheung that he began to catch the attention of Hong Kong audiences.

After leaving TVB in 2001, Lam became a contracted artiste under Andy Lau's Topman Global, and began to fully concentrate on his film career.

Lam appeared in supporting roles in a number of Lau's films such as Dance of a Dream (2001), Infernal Affairs (2002), Jiang Hu (2004), Yesterday Once More (2004) and Wait 'til You're Older (2005).

On 6 August 2021, Lam received the Variety Star Asia Award at the 20th New York Asian Film Festival.