Bovine herpesvirus-1 (BHV-1) is a member of the alphaherpesvirus subfamily which includes several prominent animal and human pathogens, including herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1). A new model for the morphogenesis of HSV-1 has recently been proposed, in which the virus is enveloped by endocytic membranes recently derived from the plasma membrane. Here we show that this model extends to a second alphaherpesvirus, BHV-1, through a detailed ultrastructural study of morphogenesis using electron microscopy and techniques which utilise the particularly high abundance of the protein VP8 in the BHV-1 tegument. These studies also revealed that greater than half of the particles released during BHV-1 infection are capsidless, non-infectious ‘light’ particles (L-particles). Such particles are composed of only tegument and an envelope, and display comparable protein profiles to virions. These L-particles were shown to be efficiently produced under conditions where DNA synthesis was inhibited, indicating that the processes of glycoprotein trafficking to the plasma membrane, retrieval into endocytic membranes, recruitment of tegument to these membranes, and the egress of these particles from the cell, all represent autonomous events which are ongoing from the early stages of infection. In short, we have demonstrated that BHV-1 infected cells can be viewed as efficient factories for the continuous and autonomous secretion of enveloped virus-like particles, irrespective of the availability of DNA for packaging. We propose BHV-1 as an excellent model for further investigation of both the process of tegumentation and the role of L-particles in virus infection.