A system and method for Feed Forward Equalizer (FFE)-Aided Clock Data Recovery (CDR) to calibrate phase offset and enhance gain in baud rate sampling phase detector is provided. In an embodiment, a clock data recovery (CDR) apparatus includes an incremental feed forward equalizer (INC-FFE) in a CDR path and a calibration component in an equalization path, the calibration component connected to the INC-FFE, the calibration component configured to adjust FFE coefficients for the INC-FFE according to a phase code (PC) index in a PC index table and one of a signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) and a bit error rate (BER) of a sampled signal, wherein the PC index table comprises adjustment values for the FFE coefficients, and wherein the PC index is linearly related to a sampling phase.