A system and method for acquiring a frequency hopped spread spectrum (FHSS) signal with no prior knowledge about the FHSS signal. In example implementations, an RF signal is received at a receiver. The RF signal is converted into a stream of digital signal levels. Energy detections are identified in the stream of digital signal as possible hops of a FHSS signal. A feature set is blindly acquired for defining an FHSS signal from the energy detections. At least one waveform classification is generated based on the feature set. Energy detections are re-acquired from the RF signal based on the waveform classification.