Selim Lake is located in the west of Yining City in the western part of China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the northern route of the Silk Road, more than 90 kilometers south-west of Bole City in the western section of the Tianshan Mountains in the alpine basin, the Urumqi - Yili highway passes along the southern shore of the lake. The lake is famous for its marvelous and beautiful natural scenery. The surface of the Sayram Lake is 2073 meters above sea level, east-west length of about 30 kilometers, north-south width of about 25 kilometers, a circumference of 90 kilometers, a water area of 455-460 square kilometers, oval, the maximum depth of 92 meters, the total amount of water storage of 21 billion cubic meters, is the highest elevation in Xinjiang, the area of the largest alpine cold-water lake. In addition to some small rivers around the lake water injection, mainly by groundwater recharge. Due to the location of higher, less evaporation, the lake water mineralization of 3 grams / liter or so, slightly salty, is a brackish lake.

The Sayram Lake is rich in water and grass, and is an excellent pasture. Every year in winter, where the snow water condensation, slightly oval lake set in the icebergs and snow plains, like a white soft silk on the shelves of a turquoise emerald. To the summer, the lake forests and streams clear, grass and flowers, the vast grasslands, the curtain tent point, smoke curls, cattle and sheep into flocks, horses, constituting a moving pasture landscape.

The climate around the lake is humid, with an average annual precipitation of nearly 400 millimeters, an average annual temperature of 1.1 degrees Celsius, long winters, cool summers, spring and fall. The vegetation around the lake is characterized by extensive grasslands and forests. Spruce forests are the main forests around the lake, with straight, strong and upright trunks, layers upon layers, weaving into tower forests. Within the shade of the forest, accompanied by birch, rowan, hawthorn and other tree species; under the forest, shallow grass flat, wild mushrooms; the forest also inhabits deer, snow chickens, golden eagles, woodpeckers and other exotic animals and rare birds, swans, geese, white-browed ducks, and other waterfowl swimming and playing in the lake.

The Sayram Lake also has a significant value of scientific investigation, the Sayram Lake formed 70 million years ago in the Himalayan orogenic movement period, geology known as the "rift valley lake". Moreover, the Quaternary lake deposits in the Sayram Lake Basin recorded the development of geomorphology of the Western Tianshan Mountains and all the history of the role of ancient glaciers, reflecting China's Northwest and Central Asia in the Quaternary climate and the environment of the several phases of change, and at the same time, also for the Northwest region of the Ice Age and Quaternary stratigraphy of the division provides scientific evidence.