Maya Jama

Jama was born and raised in Bristol, where she attended Cotham School.[2][3] She is of Somali descent on her father's side and Swedish descent on her mother's side.[1] She was named after Maya Angelou.[4] Jama moved to London at the age of 16 to pursue a career as an actress.[5]

Jama began her career early, as a teenager. She presented the weekly music video countdown on JumpOff.TV in London. She then worked for Sky on TRACE Sports and was later a weekday DJ on Rinse FM. In August 2014, Jama joined MTV as a presenter for The Wrap Up.[1] Additionally, she hosted Copa90's Maya's FIFA World Cup Cities,[6] a travelogue covering the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. Jama, likewise, co-hosted the channel's nine-part World Cup Taxi series dedicated to the event.[7][8]

In September 2017 and February 2018, Jama was a guest panellist on ITV's Loose Women.[9] In November 2017, she also became the youngest person to co-host the MOBO Awards on Channel 5 with fellow presenter Marvin Humes.[10] She has also worked closely with The BRITS, hosting their 2017 Pre-BRITS Party and hosting a live Facebook stream from the Red Carpet.

Jama co-presented the Saturday night game show Cannonball on ITV with Freddie Flintoff, Frankie Bridge, Radzi Chinyanganya and Ryan Hand also in 2017.[11]

In spring 2018, she joined the airstaff of BBC Radio 1, presenting Radio 1's Greatest Hits on Saturdays and co-presenting every Friday with Scott Mills and Chris Stark.[12]

She hosted her first ever TV show on MTV's True Love or True Lies with Dani Dyer, and The Circle on channel 4 with Alice Levine. She went on to co-present Stand Up to Cancer with long-standers Alan Carr and Adam Hills and, in October 2018, Maya became the team captain on ITV2 rap panel show Don't Hate the Playaz presented by Jordan Stephens. Since then, she has appeared on shows such as A League of Their Own Road Trip and The Big Fat Quiz of the Year.

She presented her BBC Radio 1 show on Fridays and Saturdays 10:00am–1:00pm GMT, which recently brought Maya to our screens with her first appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show, alongside punk legend Iggy Pop and British comedian Jack Whitehall. Jama has also dabbled in acting and comedic roles.[13]

Aside from presenting, Jama has gone on to become an ambassador for lingerie brand Freya and hosting their podcast, When Life Gives You Melons. She also launched her own collection with fashion brand Pretty Little Thing in summer 2018, followed by a second collection in February 2019. She is an ambassador for Adidas, appearing in the European JD Sports Christmas campaign and also an ambassador for the Australian hair care brand, Aussie Hair. She also appeared in a global GAP campaign and in a Spring/Summer 2019 campaign for Kurt Geiger.

In 2018, Jama became an ambassador for Savera UK which operates across the United Kingdom to provide services to individuals from black ethnic minority communities who are at risk of domestic abuse. In 2019, she donated blood for an NHS campaign and was found to have the rare and in demand Ro blood subtype.[14]

In November 2019, she won the People's Choice Award for best dressed star.[15] Jama later opened and hosted the 2020 EE BAFTA red carpet in a 5G powered AR dress.

In May 2020, the BBC confirmed that Maya Jama left Radio 1 after two years. She said she had "a lot of exciting commitments" happening later in the future, which meant she couldn't continue her time at Radio 1. She decided to not renew her contract in June. In early June 2020 she began co-presenting the Saturday evening BBC1 TV programme Peter Crouch: Save Our Summer.

• Maya Jama on Twitter
• Maya Jama on IMDb