[1] The R504 Kolyma Highway passes just west of the sources of the Yama.

[3] The Yama has its source in the southwestern slopes of the Maymandzhin Range, at the confluence of rivers Maimandzha and Maimachan, near Atka and not far from the sources of north-heading Maltan.

The last stretch of the Yama is in a marshy coastal area where it divides into multiple sleeves and where there are many small thermokarst lakes on the right bank.

Finally it flows by Yamsk village into the Perevolochny estuary, separated by a landspit from Yam Bay, at the southwest end of the Shelikhov Gulf, Sea of Okhotsk.

Chosenia arbutifolia) trees grow in the Yama floodplain by the banks of the river.