Methods and apparatus for emulating circuit switching in cloud networking environments are disclosed. A system includes a plurality of resources of a provider network and a resource manager. The resource manager receives a circuit switching emulation request specifying (a) a first resource group and a second resource group, and (b) a desired network traffic rate to be supported between the first and second resource groups. In response to a determination to accept the circuit switching emulation request, the resource manager initiates configuration operations associated with a network path between the first and second resource groups to allow network traffic between the first and second resource groups at a rate up to the desired network traffic rate.