diff --git a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/components/_toc-inpage.scss b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/components/_toc-inpage.scss
index af98dc4c3..b4d416494 100644
--- a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/components/_toc-inpage.scss
+++ b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/components/_toc-inpage.scss
@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ nav.page-toc {
 
   a.nav-link {
     display: block;
-    padding: 0.125rem 0;
+    padding: $toc-item-padding-y 0;
 
     // Padding w/ negative margin so the top TOC item highlight overlaps w/ the TOC border
     padding-left: 1rem;
diff --git a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/sections/_sidebar-primary.scss b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/sections/_sidebar-primary.scss
index eda6c14a1..cc337d04e 100644
--- a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/sections/_sidebar-primary.scss
+++ b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/sections/_sidebar-primary.scss
@@ -237,7 +237,7 @@ nav.bd-links {
 
   li > a {
     display: block;
-    padding: 0.25rem 0.65rem;
+    padding: $toc-item-padding-y 0.65rem;
 
     @include link-sidebar;
 
diff --git a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/variables/_layout.scss b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/variables/_layout.scss
index 571403595..28eeebe2e 100644
--- a/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/variables/_layout.scss
+++ b/src/pydata_sphinx_theme/assets/styles/variables/_layout.scss
@@ -42,3 +42,7 @@ $navbar-link-padding-y: 0.25rem;
 // contains the bounding box of the interactive element).
 // - https://github.com/Quansight-Labs/czi-scientific-python-mgmt/issues/81#issuecomment-2251325783
 $nav-icon-column-gap: 1.12rem;
+
+// Determines vertical space between entries in both the section (left/primary
+// sidebar) and page (right/secondary sidebar) table of contents
+$toc-item-padding-y: 0.25rem;