[1] Worship at St Mary Magdalen's is high church which conforms to Anglo-Catholicism.

This church was burnt down in 1074,[3] so Robert D'Oyly, the Norman Constable of Oxford, had single-aisle chapel built to replace it.

[1] A century later the scholars of newly founded Balliol College had an oratory dedicated to St Catherine in the present north aisle.

The architects for the north or "Martyrs' Aisle" were George Gilbert Scott, then young and unknown, and his partner W. B.

[1] In 1874–75 the 13th-century chancel was altered by raising the floor before the altar and adding a screen, the windows of the west tower were opened into the church and the bells were re-hung.

The west tower has a ring of 10 bells, all cast or re-cast by John Taylor & Co of Loughborough.