How to get past Google blocking gmail smtp access?

Question

I have a google account that I want to log into from the Gmail App of and android device. I ONLY want gmail, not hangouts, drive, etc. So I am trying to add the account as a standard email address in gmail.

In my gmail account I have gone to settings>Forwarding POP/IMAP and enabled IMAP. Then following these instructions (https://support.google.com/mail/answer/7126229) I try to add the email in the gmail app on my phone.

I open up Gmail>Menu>Settings>Add Account type in my email address and then click Manual set up>IMAP On the incoming settings, I type my email, password, and "imap.gmail.com"

That works fine... but then on the next step...SMTP... On the incoming settings, I type my email, password, and "smtp.gmail.com"

And is says "username or password is incorrect" And then in my gmail account, I get an email titled "Critical security alert" that says "Someone just used your password to try to sign in to your account from a non-Google app. Google blocked them, but you should check what happened."

How can I get a gmail address added to the gmail account via IMAP instead of having to add my whole google account to the whole phone?

Thanks for your help on this!!

Answer 1

I have painstakingly found the final answer to this:

Google will ALWAYS block SMTP logins from anywhere, even their own gmail app, unless you turn on the 'allow access from less secure' setting in your google account's security (https://myaccount.google.com/security)

In order to use a gmail account as a non-native gmail account without the allow-less-secure setting is to use an app that actually uses the google pass-through login.

The gmail app does not use the google pass-through login, because, why would it , it's already a google app.

The only way to use a gmail account as a non-google account inside of gmail is to use SMTP, which will require the less secure setting turned on.