The Yiwu County is located in the northeastern part of the prefecture, between the
Qarliq Shan mountain range (along which it borders on
Hami City) and the border with
Mongolia's
Govi-Altai Province. Outside of the mountain range, most of the county is within the
Gobi Desert. Some of the county important populated places are located in the oases irrigated by the intermittent Yiwu River, which flows north from the mountains, eventually disappearing in the desert. These include, from south to north, Yiwu Town (, the county seat), Weizi Xia Township () and Laomao Hu Town (). As of the 1920s, the area of today's Yiwu town was referred to as "Tuhulu" () and that name is still retained by the Tuhulu Township () adjacent to today's Yiwu town. At the time, it was the first place with an actual river and some agriculture that weary travellers from the east would reach after crossing several hundreds of kilometers of desert (since crossing
Edsin Gol, a River in
Inner Mongolia). Other places in the county include Qianshan Kazakh Township (), Yanchi Township () and Xiamaya Township (). ==Climate==