Remove sticky status from posts.

Make sure you having a working DB backup and then:

Search in the wp_options table for ‘sticky_posts’. It is a list of them in ‘option_value’ like this:

a:3:{i:0;i:1530;i:1;i:925;i:2;i:1645;}

SELECT * 
FROM  wp_options 
WHERE  option_name LIKE  'sticky_posts'
LIMIT 0 , 30

above assumes default table prefix.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by Pioneer Web Design. Reason: editor added code

The option is a list of posts, by id, (that have been marked sticky) – in a serialized format.

To make all posts no longer sticky, remove the list of them that are in the form:

a:3:{i:0;i:1530;i:1;i:925;i:2;i:1645;}

In above, there are 3 sticky posts, id’s are 1530, 925, 1645. We start counting at 0.

Just delete only that and save the table item. When it is empty there are no sticky posts. To test this is the correct list, make another post sticky, compare before and after.

Knowing above, you could also make several posts sticky by writing and adding the list (done properly).