 MacBride was educated at the Academical Institute in Belfast.He then spent a year in Neuwied on the Rhine before returning to continue his education at Queen's College, Belfast, as an external student at London University and at St John's College, Cambridge as an exhibitioner, where he became a Foundation Scholar in 1891 and Fellow in 1893.He spent a year at the Zoological Station in Naples in 1891/92 engaged in research under Anton Dohrn.