SHow only x posts in wordpress, no matter if sticky posts exist or not

Question

I'm trying to control the post output to three, but Wordpress is adding in Sticky posts which ignore my post limit. So, if I have one sticky post, the page shows 4 posts, not three as it should.

I've searched and found similar issues but the code is so different that I can't make it work in my situation. Full disclosure: I'm not a php expert.

Here's my loop:

<?php  query_posts('showposts=3'); ?>
<?php  if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>

<div class="news-item" id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?>">

<?php if ( has_post_thumbnail()) : ?>
    <a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title_attribute(); ?>" >
        <span class="meta-date-group">
            <span class="meta-date-month"><?php the_time('M'); ?></span>
            <span class="meta-date-day"><?php the_time('j'); ?></span>
        </span>
        <?php the_post_thumbnail('square'); ?>
    </a>
<?php endif; ?>
<h4 class="hnews"><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h4>

<div class="hexcerpt"><?php the_excerpt(); ?></div>
<a class="readmore" href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title_attribute(); ?>" >Read More</a>

</div><!--END news-item--> 

<?php endwhile; else: ?>

Answer 1

add this to your query argument

"post__not_in"   => get_option("sticky_posts")

or you can filter your post in loop as:

if (!is_sticky())
  {
     // your code
  }

Answer 2

Use this in your query: 'ignore_sticky_posts' => 1