A device for emulating circuit switching in Ethernet using an Ethernet circuit header (ECH) includes a node of a network that is configured to receive a packet. A control module may be configured to determine that a destination address portion of a data frame associated with the packet matches a predefined format. A parser module may be configured to parse an ECH portion of the destination address to identify a circuit-identification (ID). A look-up module may be configured to look up the circuit ID in a circuit-ID table using at least one of a plurality of key options to generate a look-up-result data. The control module may be configured to use the look-up-result data to direct the packet to a destination interface of a destination node.