diff --git a/templates/user/notification/notification_div.tmpl b/templates/user/notification/notification_div.tmpl
index 04e79ba74..bf3b51ee3 100644
--- a/templates/user/notification/notification_div.tmpl
+++ b/templates/user/notification/notification_div.tmpl
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 <div role="main" aria-label="{{.Title}}" class="page-content user notification" id="notification_div" data-sequence-number="{{.SequenceNumber}}">
 	<div class="ui container">
 		{{$notificationUnreadCount := call .NotificationUnreadCount}}
-		<div class="tw-flex tw-items-center tw-justify-between tw-mb-4">
+		<div class="tw-flex tw-items-center tw-justify-between tw-mb-[--page-spacing]">
 			<div class="small-menu-items ui compact tiny menu">
 				<a class="{{if eq .Status 1}}active {{end}}item" href="{{AppSubUrl}}/notifications?q=unread">
 					{{ctx.Locale.Tr "notification.unread"}}
diff --git a/web_src/css/base.css b/web_src/css/base.css
index 17c3f2ee6..ffbf5d01c 100644
--- a/web_src/css/base.css
+++ b/web_src/css/base.css
@@ -25,6 +25,7 @@
   --min-height-textarea: 132px; /* padding + 6 lines + border = calc(1.57142em + 6lh + 2px), but lh is not fully supported */
   --tab-size: 4;
   --checkbox-size: 16px; /* height and width of checkbox and radio inputs */
+  --page-spacing: 16px; /* space between page elements */
 }
 
 :root * {
@@ -594,11 +595,14 @@ img.ui.avatar,
   margin-bottom: 14px;
 }
 
-/* add padding to all content when there is no .secondary.nav. this uses padding instead of
-   margin because with the negative margin on .ui.grid we would have to set margin-top: 0,
-   but that does not work universally for all pages */
+/* add margin to all pages when there is no .secondary.nav */
 .page-content > :first-child:not(.secondary-nav) {
-  padding-top: 14px;
+  margin-top: var(--page-spacing);
+}
+/* if .ui.grid is the first child the first grid-column has 'padding-top: 1rem' which we need
+   to compensate here */
+.page-content > :first-child.ui.grid {
+  margin-top: calc(var(--page-spacing) - 1rem);
 }
 
 .ui.pagination.menu .active.item {
diff --git a/web_src/css/modules/flexcontainer.css b/web_src/css/modules/flexcontainer.css
index 0b559f1e7..1ca513687 100644
--- a/web_src/css/modules/flexcontainer.css
+++ b/web_src/css/modules/flexcontainer.css
@@ -2,7 +2,8 @@
 
 .flex-container {
   display: flex !important;
-  gap: 16px;
+  gap: var(--page-spacing);
+  margin-top: var(--page-spacing);
 }
 
 .flex-container-nav {