The experimental results of collecting lithium on the smooth and mesh collectors installed in the T-11M tokamak chamber with a vertical lithium limiter are presented. The collector (longitudinal) in the form of a long cylinder was installed in the near-wall region of the chamber along the toroidal axis of the tokamak. It was shown that a collector with a surface covered by several layers of stainless steel mesh collects lithium five times more than one with a smooth surface. The collection of lithium by a mesh collector with a different number of mesh layers was studied. It has been established that the most part of lithium collection (75%) is due to the two outer layers of the collector mesh. A simple mathematical model is proposed that describes the distribution of the collected lithium over the mesh layers.